Slumber Party!
by Piccolo's Love Slave
Summary: Tori, my character, goes to a slumber party that starts out fun, but then tragedy of life and death and love and a few villians add a bit of spice to the sauce, so to speak.
1. The Day Is Saved!

He hadn't really meant to be watching her. He'd actually been asked by Bulma if he'd go see what was taking her new friend so long and had ended up trailing her, wondering what the hell he was doing babysitting, because he realized that was pretty much what Bulma sent him to do. He didn't know why he didn't just go up to her and introduce himself. It would have been the proper thing to do. Instead, he had just been watching and listening.  
  
He sighed, now it looked like the girl was in trouble and he'd have to go rescue her. He really did not want to listen to all the women screeching at him if he failed to do so.  
  
"I suggest you let the girl go." He said, glowering threateningly at the three thugs he had just materialized in front of. She looked up and they just laughed. He quickly pulled her away and shoved her behind himself, hissing to her; "Stay back if you don't want to get hurt!"  
  
"Who are you?" One of the thugs asked, mockingly, "You can't just swoop down 'ere and take our prize!"  
  
"Yeah! That's not sportin' of ya at all!"  
  
"Are you going to stop me?"  
  
"Well.I.ummm." The first thug stammered, suddenly unsure, and not to graceful on his feet, either.  
  
"Your too drunk to do anything!" Tori's sudden rescuer said, disgusted, "Go sober up and maybe, just maybe, it'd be worth my time to beat the crap out of you. I doubt it, though." He turned around to leave, not bothing with the men behind him and felt the clumsly attack rather than heard it.  
  
Tori had never seen anyone like him. She sat in the middle of the street, as he laid waste to the three horrible men who had been harassing her so fast that she was afraid she may have missed something. Everything happened so fast! One minute, they were charging at his back, the next all three were sprawled on the ground, either not moving at all or moaning softly.  
  
"Are you okay?" It took her a moment to realized he was talking to her. She got up and shook her head, still a bit dazed, and more than a little frightened.  
  
"I-I guess so." She said, "Umm.thanks."  
  
"Don't mention it." He said, "Your on your way to Bulma's, right?"  
  
"That's right! How did you know?"  
  
"I'm one of her friends." He said, "She asked me to see what was taking you so long."  
  
"Oh." Tori said, "Okay. My name is Tori by the way."  
  
"Piccolo." Tori had gathered her stuff together again and started walking, Piccolo floated in the air beside her. She thought that was a bit odd, the floating, but then, she'd never met anyone who was green before either so she decided the floating wasn't too weird, all things considered. "You know, you really should have a way to defend yourself from guys like that, Tori."  
  
"Well, I normally don't go walking alone after dark.but I sorta got side- tracked." She said, "Thinking about other things, my old friends and town and daydreaming about stuff."  
  
"Not paying attention to where you were going." He said, "Next time, stay awake and maybe things like that won't happen to you!"  
  
"Thanks again, Piccolo." She said softly, "For showing up when you did. I really mean it."  
  
"Well, you were lucky." He said, Did she notice a faint flushing to his face? "There's not always going to be someone nearby to come rescue you."  
  
"I know." She said, as if she'd heard and said it a thousand times before; "Stuff like that only happens on goofy tv shows and in books."  
  
"Precisely."  
  
Bulma was looking out the window, waiting anxiously. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw Piccolo's familiar form and Tori's considerablly smaller figure coming towards the house. She raced to the door just as they were at the end of he walk-way and ran down to embrace Tori.  
  
"Tori! I was so worried! What happened? Why is your makeup smudged around your eyes? Have you been crying? Piccolo! What did you say to her!?"  
  
Piccolo shook his head, "I didn't."  
  
"It's okay, Bulma!" Tori said quickly, "I was.approached.by some hoodlums, but he got rid of them for me."  
  
"Oooh!" Bulma said, her arm around Tori's shoulder, she gave Piccolo a brief smile, "Thanks, Piccolo. Come on, lets go inside and have some coffee. I should have warned you that it's not so safe to go walking out alone at night around here, Tori."  
  
Piccolo didn't bother with a reply. He took off into the darkness, seeking solitude elsewhere. He failed to see Tori look over her shoulder at him with a strange glint in her blue eyes that could have been something more than curiosity.  
  
"Hey, guys, come over here and meet my new friend, Tori!" Tori was called from her musings by Bulma's loud, excited voice, "Tori, this is Goku, Krillin, Gohan, Krillin's girlfriend Marron and Master Roshi, The Turtle Hermet, guys, this is my new friend Tori. We met at the mall a few weeks ago!"  
  
"Nice to meet you, Tori!" Krillin, the short bald one, spoke first, holding out his hand to her. Tori took it and shook it breifly. "Are you hungry, Tori?" The one with the weird hair she remembered was called Goku, she shook her head and smiled at Gohan. Marron, whose hair was just one shade off Bulma's, hugged her and giggled and the old man leered at her; "What's a pretty young thing doing in a place like this?"  
  
Tori shook her head, overwhelmed and Bulma pulled her quickly away and into the kitchen, fixing her a cup of coffee with cream and sugar. "Sorry about that. They get.overexcited at times."  
  
"Oh, no, It's okay, Bulma." Tori smiled, "I don't mind. A nice welcome.is well.nice!"  
  
"Yeah! Your right! It is nice!" Bulma sat down at the table next to her, "So, tell me, Tori, how are you settling in? School okay?"  
  
"Well, I miss my old school.and my old friends." She said, "But, I think it's gonna be.interesting living here."  
  
"Are you sure your okay after tonight? You don't need to go lay down?" Bulma placed her hand over Tori's gently and looked concerned. Tori shook her head and said; "It was scary at first. But, nothing really happened and it's over now, the past, not even worth a second thought.well, other than remembering never to go out walking at night alone again here!"  
  
"That's for sure!"  
  
"Excuse me, are you going to stay over tonight, Tori?" Tori turned in her seat to see the little boy, Gohan, yes that was his name, standing in the doorway. She smiled at him and nodded; "Bulma invited me. I hope that's okay."  
  
He grinned at her and said; "Sure it is! Do you want to watch me train?"  
  
"What?" Tori smiled, shaking her head, and looked at Bulma, who laughed, "Sure, kiddo. Sounds like fun."  
  
"Not really." He said, "Piccolo doesn't really like to have fun.but I'm getting stronger and stronger every day!"  
  
"Get out of here!" Bulma yelled, "Can't you see we're trying to talk?"  
  
"Cute kid." Tori said, turning back to Bulma, "Kinda reminds me of my little brother."  
  
"Oh, he's a pest." Bulma said, "But, your right, he is cute! Little kids usually are!"  
  
"Um, Bulma," Tori began, after taking a sip of her coffee and nearly burning her tongue, "About Piccolo."  
  
"Oh, don't worry about him." She said, refilling her own cup, "He may not talk much, but he's one of the good guys. Don't let the way he looks frighten you."  
  
"Oh, no, it doesn't.I mean." Tori began, stumbled over her words and blushed, "I was just.curious about him. I've never seen anyone like him before."  
  
"That's because he's a namek, Tori." Bulma said, and began to explain to her exactly what and where beings like Piccolo hailed from. When she was finished, Tori just shook her head, more than a little overwhelmed. She held out her cup for another refill and Bulma went on to tell her about herself and her friends and family.  
  
A few hours later, Piccolo was back and sitting outside the house, near the little fishpond Bulma had built in the backyard on a whim, the night air cool on his skin as he sat on the grass and watched the dark waters of the pond ripple and bubble with the fish beneath it.  
  
He could hear, with his sensitive ears, the females giggling and talking indoors and knew that Bulma's little get-together was in full swing. He was a little curious as to what, exactly women do together.but had more dignity than to go sneaking about trying to alleviate said curiosity. He decided to meditate instead. 


	2. Tori's Close Call

It had been a difficult day. Shoving a lock her blonde hair from her eyes, the girl sighed and sat down hard on the grass outside her house. She didn't really want to go inside yet and face her family. She thought she deserved a little peace inbetween her hectic school schedraul and her home life, didn't she?  
  
Besides, it was Friday and her mother had all ready promised her two days before that she could go over to her new friend's house and stay the night. In fact, her friend had told her it was going to be a slumber party and she said she'd introduce her to some other people she knew.  
  
There was a sudden chirping noise and she realized it was her cell phone. Flipping back he cover, she spoke in her normal, somewhat breathless voice, "Hello?"  
  
"Tori?" The voice on the other end asked, also breathless, "So, are you coming over or what? I've got everything ready and the others are just dying to meet you! So hurry up and get your butt over here, girl!"  
  
"I have to say night to my Mom, Bulma, and grab my overnight bag." She giggled, tossing her flaxen hair behind one ear as she stood up and walked to her front door, "I'll be there."  
  
"Hurry up! We can't start this little party with you!" Bulma cried before hanging up the phone. Clicking the cover shut on her phone, Tori stuffed it into her pants' pocket and went inside her house.  
  
"I'm just here to grab my stuff and then I'm leaving!" She cried as she raced up the stairs to her room, grabbed her bag, which she had all ready packed the night before, and raced back down, "Don't wait up tomorrow, byeIloveya!"  
  
She shut the door and hoped down the porch steps, taking them two by two. She sighed with relief when no one came running after her demanding her time and attention. Sometimes it was a pain in the butt being the older sister. She smiled and started in the direction she knew her new friend lived.  
  
It had been a god-send when she'd ran into the pretty, blue-haired woman at clothing store a few weeks ago. Tori and her family had just moved into the neighborhood and she had yet to meet any other girls she could talk with. Even though, she was a senior in high school and Bulma and her friends were too old for school, they were only a few years older than Tori and Bulma acted younger a lot of the time so had gotten along great with Tori, especially when she'd needed a friend so bad.  
  
As she approached the street that Bulma said she lived on, she realized that she'd been walking for quite some time. The afternoon had been steadily becoming darker and darker. Tori paused for a moment, looking around, hoping that the house was coming up soon. As much as she enjoyed peaceful walks in the dark, something told her that tonight was not a good night to be walking out alone. A cat hissed and she heard a garabage can fall over with a crash and some animal, could have been the cat, yowl in pain or surprise followed closely by the bark of an excited dog.  
  
Shuddering, Tori started across the street. Suddenly, without warning, three hulking shadows rose up from all around her. She spun about, terrified, as they drew nearer and she realized they were men. Mean looking men. She heard one of them laugh and it sounded like a metal cheese grater being scrapped upon a chain-link fence, making her wince.  
  
"Looky what we got here!" One of them, the one directly in front of her said, laughing, "What's a matter, babe? Out all by ya lonesome?"  
  
Tori looked around frantically for an escape route, but found none. She felt the two behind her as they stepped closer. The one who'd spoken grabbed her face and roughly turned it towards him, her eyes wide with terror; "Oh, don't go being a little baby and all. We jus' wanna have s'fun, ya know?"  
  
She could smell beer on his rancid breath and tried to turn away in disgust. Someone was behind her, tugging on her jacket. She screamed and swung wide with her overnight bag, hitting the one who'd grabbed her face in the stomach and the one who'd grabbed her jacket on the side of the head. "Get away from me!!"  
  
"Why you little.!" She heard one of them, the one from behind her, she thought, cursed as he picked himself off of the ground and advanced on her once more, "Your gonna pay for that, you bitch!"  
  
Tori did not answer in words, she just continued to scream and swing her bag in front of her, backing away, desperately. Tears were streaming down her cheeks and it was getting difficult for her to see what was in front of her as everything was becoming a foggy, liquid blur. 


	3. Truth or Dare?

Tori looked at the women seated around her on pillows from the sofa and blankets dragged from the bedrooms. Her friend Bulma was there, wearing pink and blue pajamas with feet in them that made her look cute and innocent, her blue hair was in pigtails and Krillin's girlfriend Marron, who wasn't very bright, she had discovered. Marron had just decided to wear a clingy little light peace colored shift that left not much to the imagination.  
  
"I'm so glad you decided to put off making that pot roast, Chi Chi!" Bulma cried, reaching over to squeeze her friend's hand, "It wouldn't have been a party without you!"  
  
Chi Chi smiled and smoothed the wrinkled out of her own off-white cotton nightgown. Tori noticed that she wore her hair up in a style that made her think of mothers for some reason. She knew that Chi Chi was Gohan's mother and she could see a bit of the boy in the mother.  
  
"Now, what should we do first?" Bulma asked, "I know! Tori, since your new, why don't you introduce youself to eveyone?"  
  
Tori blushed, she hated being put on the spot, but cleared her throat. She sat leaning up against the bottom of the sofa, her arms around her drawn up knees. The nightshirt she wore was neither overly girly or ugly by any means. It was just a black shirt that was too big for her with the words; "Closed Minds Should Come With Closed Mouths" scrawled across the front in big dark green letters.  
  
"Well, My name is Tori Lawson." She began, "I used to live in a little town but my father had to transfer and so we moved here." She had begun to play with her long golden hair, a nervous habit and chewed on the ends absently, "I have a little sister, April, who is three years younger than me and a brother, Todd, who is five years old now. Normally, it's my job to take care of them, but my Mom said that I didn't have to for tonight."  
  
"I have an idea!" Marron said, which surprised everyone, and Bulma asked if the girl felt okay, "Why don't we play a game."  
  
"Okay, sure!" Chi Chi smiled, "What kind of game did you have in mind, Marron?"  
  
"Something fun!" The girl giggled, an odd glint in her blue eyes, "Truth or Dare! She pointed at Tori, challenge in her gaze, "What do you pick, Tori? Truth or Dare?"  
  
Tori thought about how to get out of this, but at both Chi Chi and Bulma's expectant looks, she suddenly felt like an animal trapped in a cage, there was no escape and she had to choice something.anything!  
  
"Ummm.Truth.I guess." She just hoped they weren't too probing. She waited for her question which she knew much be answered honestly, as are the rules of the game.  
  
"Let me ask!" Bulma cried, clapping her hands, "Let me ask!"  
  
"Okay, Bulma," Chi Chi said, "Ask!"  
  
"Tori." She paused, thinking, "Do you like someone?" She winked at the younger girl and laughed, "Come one! You have to be honest, remember?"  
  
"No." Tori said, but just for a spit second she saw Piccolo's face in her mind's eye, she shook her head and the vision faded, "No, of course not. I just moved here, I haven't had time to get knew anyone long enough to start to like them. Marron! Truth or Dare?!"  
  
Tori knew how to play this game as well as any other girl. It was, after all, one of the most popular slumber party games ever. Marron took the dare and Tori had to think of something for the eager girl to do. Finally she giggled behind her hand, thinking of something.  
  
She whispered to Marron, who flushed a nice shade of red. "I'm not gonna do THAT!" She cried, but Tori just smiled, "You have to, Marron. It's part of the game. If you refuse, you forfeit and your out!"  
  
"But.but, the boys are in there!" Marron looked back at the room down the hall where Goku, Gohan and Krillin were suppose to be sleeping. Master Roshi had gone home a few hours ago. Sadly, he said he couldn't stay up as late as he used to when he was much younger. "What if one of them sees!?"  
  
Tori laughed, "That's the point, Marron! Go on! It's not that bad!"  
  
Grumbling, Marron stood up and walked to the door. Sighing loudly, she took one look back at the women, who just nodded and made 'go on! Do it!' gestures with their hands, and opened the door.  
  
"I can't believe your making me do this!" She said through her teeth, than she sang out loud enough for Piccolo to hear even if he'd not had very acute hearing, "I'm a little teapot, short and stout, here is my handle, here is my spout!" She lifted her nightdress up over head and exposed her breasts, which jiggled with her little dance, "..tip me over and pour me out!"  
  
She hadn't even finished the song before the other women were rolling on the ground, tears streaming from their eyes as they laughed so hard at poor Marron, who had run back to her place and buried her face in her pillow, pretending to be angry.  
  
"Daddy?" Gohan wiped his eyes, still half awake. He thought he'd heard someone singing about teapots; "What was that?"  
  
Goku sat straight up in bed, eyes wide with shock and a goofy look on his face, "N-nothing, son.go back to sleep." He looked over at the next bed where his friend was still dead to the world. That god Krillin hadn't woken up! Just what in the world was that girl thinking?! He rolled over and tried to go back to sleep.  
  
"I can't believe you made me DO that!" Marron cried again for the hundreth time.  
  
"Oh, stop!" Bulma said, giggling, "I bet they didn't even move an inch! They can sleep through a hurricane!"  
  
"Yeah, your probably right." Marron said, she really hadn't been able to see very clearly into the room with the light from the hall on behind her, "They probably didn't even wake up."  
  
"Since you went when we started, Marron, and Tori after Marron," Chi Chi said, "I think it's only fair that either me or Bulma go next, that way no one gets two turns in a row."  
  
"I understand." Bulma said, "Chi Chi, do you want to go next?"  
  
Chi Chi shook her dark hair, "No, you go, Bulma."  
  
"Okay. Let me think.Tori, I am picking you, what do you want to do, truth or dare?"  
  
"Well, since I already did a truth.I guess dare." She said, glancing at Marron, "Just don't make me do something like her's!"  
  
"Oh, I see you can give it but can't take it, huh?" Chi Chi teased, "Your just lucky it's not me thinking up a dare for you!"  
  
Still in thought, Bulma saw Piccolo standing outside out the window from the corner of her eye and her smile grew wider. She turned back to Tori, who wanted to shrink away from her bright gleaming eyes, "Ready for the dare, Tori?"  
  
Tori sighed and nodded, the faster she knew what it was, the faster she could get it over with.  
  
She motioned for Tori to come closer and began to whisper something in her ear. Tori's eyes widened and she looked out the window. "So, do you accept?"  
  
"I'm not sure.I."  
  
"Do you accept?" Bulma asked again, trying to be serious, "It's a simple question, Tori. Yes or no?"  
  
"Without his permission?" She asked, squirming in her seat, wondering how she could get out of this without losing. She did not want to lose. She did not want to a bad sport at all! "But, wouldn't that be.?"  
  
"Yes or no, Tori?" Bulma said again, "Come on, we don't have all night, you know!"  
  
"Okay! Okay!" Tori threw up her hands in defeat, "I'll try."  
  
"Do! Or do not!" Bulma went into her best Yoda, "There is no try!"  
  
"Yeah, whatever, Yoda!" Tori said, sarcastically, "Go back to Dagobah!"  
  
She ducked as Bulma threw a pillow from the sofa at her head. "Shut up and go do your dare!" 


	4. Tori's Dare

Sighing, Tori shoved a lock of her blonde hair behind an ear and stood up, taking the blanket she had wrapped around herself with her. She would have taken it outside as well had not the end gotten caught on something and it was yanked from her grip. She looked back and gave a grinning Bulma a look like the inside of a dark cave and turned back to the door.  
  
"Remember!" Chi Chi yelled in a whisper, if that makes any sense! "You can't ask him or it doesn't count!"  
  
"I know! I know!" Tori growled back at her, "Stop pushing me! I'm going, okay!"  
  
"We'll be watching!" Marron said, giggling behind her hand. Chi Chi reached over and smacked her, telling her to hush.  
  
Piccolo opened one eye, looking to his left where he saw the new girl closing the door behind her. She wore only a long tee-shirt and he could see he shivering from the cold as she stood there, seemingly uncertain, her arms embracing herself as she stood there.  
  
Great. How am I going to do this? Tori stood there realizing how foolish she must look, standing on the porch in her nightshirt shivering in the middle of the night, for god's sake! She closed her eyes, breathed deeply, and opened them again, smiling as she walked towards Piccolo.  
  
What is she up to? Piccolo didn't know, but he didn't like the way she was smiling. It was as if she weren't really smiling at him, more like through him. It gave him an odd feeling he wasn't sure he liked. What's more, something glinted in the moonlight and he realized she held something in her right hand. A weapon? Was she planning on attacking him? Why?  
  
Before he could do anything, though, she had grabbed the end of his long, flowing white cape and with a few slashes had severed a small piece. She held it in her hand along with the scissors Chi Chi had given her for the task and looked back at the house where she knew the others were watching.  
  
"What are you doing?!" Piccolo cried, when he realized what had just happened, "My cape!"  
  
Tori knew her dare would be forfeited if she spoke, so she just pretended not to hear and turned and ran back into the house, slamming the door behind her. Bulma pulled her into the living room and Marron threw a pillow at them. "I thought you'd have chickened out, Tori!" Bulma cried, laughing.  
  
"Was he mad?" Marron asked, looking nervously towards the door, "I hope that didn't make him mad?"  
  
"Probably!" Tori said, still holding her prize, "But I think he was more shocked than anything.Oh, I hope I didn't ruin his clothes."  
  
"Oh, don't worry!" Chi Chi said, "He can summon another cape. It's no big deal."  
  
Piccolo stood near the pond, holding one end of his cape in his hands and looking down at the missing part. He couldn't believe what that girl just did! How.? What was she thinking? He shook his head, shrugged off the cape, which disapeared before it hit the ground and summoned a replacement out of thin air.  
  
Better watch out for grinning females with scissors, He thought as he went back to his mediation, That girl is odd. 


	5. A New Game

Tori sat on the floor between Chi Chi and Marron. Bulma was behind her busy plaiting Tori's long white-gold hair into several long thin braids and twining colorful ribbons around and within each braid. Marron sighed and flipped through a fashion magazine absently, not really seeing the pages and their anorexic models in the height of fashion. Chi Chi reached into the bag of chips they had brought out from the kitchen and pulled out a handful of the greasy, salty substance.  
  
"Okay, I can't stand this any more!" Marron cried, dropping the magizine on the floor beside her, she tossed her blue hair from her eyes, "Can this get any more boring?!"  
  
"We can watch a movie?" Bulma suggested, looking towards the cabinet beneath the television that housed her collection of videos, "Or play another game?"  
  
"As long as it's not truth or dare!" Tori cried, "I've had enough of that game for one night."  
  
"I have an idea!" Chi Chi said, grinning like the cat who just ate the canary, "Wait here!"  
  
All three women waited, curious and looking at each other with shrugs and smiled as Chi Chi ran out of the room towards the kitchen. "What's doing?" Tori asked, but no one replied, they were just as bewildered as she. In moments, Chi Chi had returned carrying what could only be a bottle of wine and several very pretty crystal glasses.  
  
She handed out the glasses and proceeded to open the bottle, which was easier said than done. She smiled as she poured the blood-like liquid into each glass; "Now, it's a party!"  
  
"Chi Chi!" Bulma cried, sniffing her glass, "Where's you get this? You don't drink."  
  
"It was a wedding gift." Chi Chi explained, "For Goku and I. But since neither of us drinks it was just sitting there in the cupboard.I was saving it for a special occasion."  
  
"We can't drink your wedding present!" Tori exclaimed, trying to give her glass back to Chi Chi, "It wouldn't be right!"  
  
"It's okay, Tori!" Chi Chi laughed, refusing to take the glass, a bit of the wine sloshed out, "Besides, this is a special occasion..."  
  
"Yeah, Tori!" Bulma said, after gulping down her drink, "A girls' slumber party!"  
  
"Hey! After we finish this bottle," Marron said, "Wanna play spin-the- bottle with it?"  
  
The other women gave her numerous odd looks; "But, Marron, we're all girls here." Bulma said.  
  
"That would be kinda.weird." Chi Chi finished and ducked as Marron threw a pillow at her.  
  
"I know what we can do!" Tori said, after having drank her second glass of wine. She felt all fuzzy and warm inside, a pleasant buzzing noise filled her ears, she giggled when she talked, unaware of how she sounded, "Bulma, the grounds your house is on, it's big, huh?"  
  
"Yep!" Bulma hiccuped, she was laying upside-down on the sofa, her head hanging off the edge and she regarded her new friend through hazy eyes, she blinked to bring her surroundings back into focus, "Lots and lots of shrubberies.!" She exploded in peals of laughter, "What'cha got on your mind, Tori?"  
  
"Hide and seek!" Tori smiled, and ducked as Marron threw a pillow at her head, even though the movement made her dizzy, she stood up and cried; "Come on! It'll be fun!"  
  
"I don't think I can even move, Tori." Chi Chi said, feeling sick as everything wouldn't stop spinning, "Much less go outside and run around."  
  
"Aaaw, come on!" Tori cried, pulling Chi Chi up by her arm, "The fresh air will do you good.let's go!"  
  
"I'm game!" Bulma cried, giggling, she fell over and landed right-side up on the floor by the sofa, "Who wants to be 'it', first?"  
  
"Let's draw straws!" Tori said, "Smallest wins."  
  
A few moments later, as Bulma stayed inside and counted, without peeking, the remaining women ran outside and swiftly, well as swiftly as their drink- muddled brains could allow, they found hiding places around the property. Piccolo had remained by the fishpond, floating in the air, deep in meditation. But he had not failed to see the women scurried about in that kind of noisy quiet that often comes of trying to be silent but not really caring if one is or is not.  
  
He wondered what they were up to. Probably just some silly game they were playing. No need to pay it any mind. He went back to his meditation.  
  
"Hey! What's going on here?" Piccolo sighed and opened his eyes, regarding the man who had just flown up and landed in front of him, "Where is everyone? I can feel them all.but from all over the place."  
  
"Bulma's having a party." Piccolo said, "They're playing some kind of game, I think."  
  
"Hmm," Vegeta said, "I see. Well, if you see her tell her I don't appriecate being stood up."  
  
"Tell her yourself." Piccolo said, returning to his mediation, "I'm not a messanger." 


	6. Are We Having Fun, Yet!

Fuming, Vegeta stood there and called; "Bulma! Get out here, now! I want to speak with you!"  
  
From her hiding place beneath a rather overgrown bush, Tori heard and wondered who it was that was shouting so. Doesn't he have the common decency to go speak to Bulma face to face instead of screaming for her in the middle of the lawn?! She waited, knowing that if she stood up or spoke, her hiding place would be pointless. As she knelt there, shivering from the cold, she had to wonder exactly what she was doing there.  
  
If I don't get found in the next five minutes, I'm going inside! Screw this! She thought, My legs are falling asleep! She sighed heavily and wished she were curled up on the sofa with a blanket and a bowl of popcorn. She heard breif yelling which sounded like Bulma and the man she had heard and then everything was silent.  
  
Vegeta nodded when Bulma told him what she and the other women were up to. Hide and seek. An earth children's game. He'd heard of it before, but hadn't wanted to waste his time observing or, god forbid, playing it! What four grown women were doing playing such an asinine game, he had no clue.  
  
He walked to the hiding place he knew Bulma's new little friend was, he sneered at her weak power level, Pathetic, really, and parted the branches to look down at her startled face. "Come on out. The game's over."  
  
Thank god! Tori thought, even though she glared up at him for ruining her 'fun', "Who are you?"  
  
Vegeta didn't like the tone of her voice when she asked her question. She still sat in the shrubbery, her arms folded under her breasts and studied him warily. She reminded him of a cornered animal who did not know enough to be afraid of it's captor's. He asnwered her question with no little amount of arrogance and she snorted and stood up, brushing past him like he was less than important and entered the house.  
  
Vegeta seethed in anger and clenched his fists. How he wanted to hurl a ki blast at the uppity little bitch and elimate her from the face of the planet. But, he stayed his hand. After all, she was Bulma's friend and as much as she got on his nerves, he did indeed have feelings for the blue haired minx.  
  
Instead, he narrowed his eyes and took off into the air, deciding to forget about the women for awhile and go work on his training.even though it was late into the night.  
  
Piccolo had watched the exchange between Vegeta and Tori and smiled slightly to himself.  
  
"What are you grinning about?" He spun around, he hadn't realized that she'd come back out. Didn't he just see her go into the house? How could she be standing behind him when he's clearly seen her walk inside and close the door? "Not much of a game, huh? He ruined it."  
  
The other women had abandoned their hiding places and wandered indoors to escape the chill night air. Piccolo studied her and wondered why she wasn't inside as well instead of standing there obviously freezing in nothing but her knee-length black tee-shirt and ankle socks. She looked very vulnerable and small to him. "Nothing." He replied, "Your going to get sick."  
  
She cocked her head to one side and raised a delicate eyebrow, "How's that?"  
  
"If you stay outside in your.your nightclothes.your going to get sick from the chill." He said, not knowing why he cared, if he did at all, "Go back inside before you freeze."  
  
"I can handle a little cold." She said, laughing, and he realized that she was a bit tipsy from whatever she and the others had been drinking, no wonder she wasn't cold! "Besides, I feel all warm inside anyway."  
  
"You won't by morning."  
  
"Hey, listen." She said, suddenly becoming serious, she reached out and touched his hand lightly, "I really meant it when I thanked you for earilier and.I'm sorry about your cape.it was just a stupid dare."  
  
He looked down at her hand then back to her face, "It's nothing. Don't trouble yourself."  
  
She heard some commotion in the house and said, "I have to go. They're going to wonder what I'm doing." She grasped an end of his cape and pulled him downward, he did not resist, towards her. "It was nice meeting you." She said and kissed him briefly on the cheek.  
  
Tori turned to walk back inside, leaving a bemused namek behind her. From her place near the window, Bulma smiled behind her raised hand. Chi Chi looked at her and then out the window at Tori and back to Bulma. "What's going on?"  
  
Bulma just shrugged as Tori walked back into the room, holding a deck of cards she'd picked up from the desk next to the foyer. "Anyone for a game of strip poker?" She asked and giggled, "Should be fun."  
  
"I'm not sure." Chi Chi said, turning a bright shade of crimson, but both Bulma and Marron were in. They coaxed Chi Chi until she had to relent, mostly by tickling and poucing on her with pillows.  
  
"We'd better keep it down." Chi Chi said, starting to whisper, "We don't want to wake the boys."  
  
"Too late, Mom." They turned to see little Gohan standing there, rubbing his eyes, his father; Goku and their friend Krillin were behind him, grinning at the women.  
  
"What's this about strip poker?" Krillin asked, eyeing Tori, at which point his girlfriend threw a pillow at his head, which he ducked easily enough.  
  
"Gohan, honey," Chi Chi said, ushering her son out of the room, "Go back to bed and get some sleep."  
  
"But, I wanted." But he yawned and could not quarrel with his mother, espeically since he was actually still sleepy. Chi Chi tucked him in and kissed him goodnight. She closed the door to the bedroom on her way out.  
  
She found the others back in the living room, Tori was all ready busing dealing out the cards to each player. She smiled at her husband. This should be interesting.She thought. Just then, she heard the front door open and close and looked up to see Vegeta's smirking face standing in the entryway to the livingroom.  
  
"Vegeta, want to play?" Bulma said upon seeing him standing there, "Come on, it will be fun."  
  
"What kind of stupid game are you playing now?" He asked, but sat down next to Bulma and accepted the cards Tori handed him.  
  
"Have you ever played this game?" Tori asked, "Strip poker?"  
  
"No." He said, glaring down at his cards, what was he suppose to do now?  
  
"Then how do you know it's stupid?"  
  
He looked up at her, then at Goku and back to her; "Because," He said, "Kakkarot is playing. It must be stupid."  
  
Chi Chi threw a pillow at Vegeta's head. Which, of course, he ducked and it flew past him to hit the wall.  
  
"Okay, enough." Tori said, "Let's play! Someone want to explain the rules to Veggie, here?"  
  
"Don't call me that!" Vegeta snarled, "You will adress me as Vegeta, Prince of."  
  
"Oh, just be quiet and listen so you can know how we play this!" Bulma said, "You can spout off your fancy heiratage for her later, if she's even insterested."  
  
Bulma looked over at Tori just in time to see her rolling her eyes and fell backwards into a fit of giggles. The men just stared, not knowing, what, exactly, to make of them or their odd behaviour.  
  
"Are we going to play or not?" Krillin asked, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, "If not, I'd just as soon go back to sleep."  
  
"Yeah, when are you girls going to bed, anyway?" Goku asked, yawning, "It's about three in the morning."  
  
The women exchanged glances and Bulma said; "We can't, Goku. The first one of us to fall asleep gets it."  
  
Goku did not ask what, exactly, 'it' was, but by the looks they were passing back and forth amongst each other, he guessed it wasn't good. He looked at Krillin and noticed that he seemd to know what the hell was going on, or at least, he was good at faking it. He studied the cards in his hand. Deciding to just forget about whatever the women had planned for each other.  
  
"Too bad Master Roshi isn't here!" Krillin whispered aside to Goku, "This would be his dream come true!"  
  
"Geez! Come on! Let's play all ready!" Vegeta cried, losing what little paitience he had started with, "I'll be ready to collect social security by the time we start this game!" 


	7. Secrets We Keep

Half an hour into the game, Tori sat crossed-legged on the carpet, holding a half-empty glass of wine in on one hand and her cards in the other. She was aware of the goofy grin she had on her face as the alcohol dimmed her perceptions. She held her cards up and squinted at them, trying to make them stop moving so she could see what she held.  
  
"Your losing, Tori." Vegeta said, looking over his own cards at her, he was shirtless but still wearing pants, which was more than could be said for Tori, she just shrugged and grinned at him, "Yer kinda cute." She said, and fell backwards, laughing.  
  
"And your kinda drunk." He answered, shaking his head, "Bulma, I think Tori needs to go lay down for awhile."  
  
"Aaaw, no way!" Tori sat back up, not bothering to cover herself up. She still had on her bra and panties anyway and her cute little ankle socks, so she didn't think she was that far gone, "I still got my undies on! I'm still in the game!"  
  
"You can't even read your cards!" Vegeta exclaimed, "How can you play if your too drunk to even see what cards you have?!"  
  
Tori blinked at him, still smiling, and said; "I'll manage."  
  
"I really think this game is about over," Chi Chi said, her arms over her breasts to sheild them from view, She yawned loudly, "I don't know about anyone else, but I am getting tired."  
  
"Ah, ah!" Marron wagged a finger at Chi Chi, She was the first one to lose every article of clothing and sat next to Bulma, who still had on her underwear, like Tori, and said; "You know what happens to the one who falls asleep first!"  
  
"What happens?" Krillin asked, in the fix as Vegeta, clothing wise, "Bulma? Chi Chi?"  
  
Bulma shrugged, not meeting anyone's eyes, Chi Chi just sighed heavily, and Tori giggled. Vegeta looked at each of them in disgust and threw down his cards; "Stupid game."  
  
Goku looked at his wife, openly admiring her supple form and then at Vegeta, "It's not that bad."  
  
Tori opened one eye as she lay on her side on the floor, gazing over at Goku; "He looks cute in his underwear." She said, and then caught herself, "Did I say that aloud?" Her cheeks burned and she covered her face with her hands, trying not to giggle, but failing miserably.  
  
Chi Chi smiled at her and then at Goku, she reached over and pulled the younger woman's hands away from her face; "Your right, he does look cute in his underwear. I'm glad I married him."  
  
"Lucky!" Tori slurred, "You get to see him in his underwear any time you want!"  
  
"Okay, okay!" Goku said, his own face burning, "Enough about me and my underwear!"  
  
"What a brilliant conversation topic," Vegeta said, his tone dripping with sarcasm, "Kakkorot and his underwear. And I'm missing a good night's sleep for this?!"  
  
"We can talk about you and your underwear." Tori beamed, and winked at Vegeta, who seemed taken aback for all of five seconds. Before he could say anything; Bulma jumped in; "He does look good in them, that's for sure."  
  
"Bet he does!" Tori exclaimed, laughing, "Hey, Veggie, wanna model your underwear for us?"  
  
"I'd rather." "Don't you dare finish that senstence!" Bulma cried, "We're only playing with you, Veggie!"  
  
"Well, I'm tired and this is a waste of time." He said, standing up, "You idiots can stay here and do whatever, I'm going to bed."  
  
As he was walking out of the room, Tori, who had sat back up again, giggled and pointed; "Nice butt!"  
  
The other women laughed, Krillin looked embarraced but happy to be there, and poor Goku just looked confused. It was a look he wore well. Like his underwear.  
  
"I am really getting sleepy, guys." Chi Chi said, and when even Marron could not stifle a yawn, they knew it was time to sleep, finally. "Tori, you can have the sofa in here, okay?"  
  
Tori nodded, still feeling the pleasant effects of the wine, and stopped Bulma before she could go to her room, "Thank you for inviting me."  
  
"No problem, hon." Bulma smiled, squeezing her hand warmly, "It was fun."  
  
"Yep!" Tori said, "G'night!"  
  
"Good night, Tori." Chi Chi said, as she linked her arm through Goku's, "It was very nice meeting you. Sleep tight!"  
  
Marron reached down to kiss Tori lightly on the cheek; "Night, sis!"  
  
"You need to work on your poker face, Tori." Goku said, as he waved to her, "'Night!"  
  
"See ya later." Krillin said, smiling at Tori, "Don't let the bedbugs bite!"  
  
"Hey, all!" Tori cried, and everyone paused in midstep, "Don't think that just by leaving me and pretending your all going to sleep is going to fool me into letting my guard down and actally falling asleep and becoming prey to some disturbing joke you all have planned, now, cause it won't work!"  
  
"Oh, Tori," Bulma said, sighing, "We're all too pooped to even think about that, now!"  
  
"Yeah, no one even wants to try and stay awake, now, we all just want to go to bed!" Chi Chi said, "You should too!"  
  
Tori shook her head, her arms folded across her chest, "Nope. Not gonna work. No way."  
  
"Just go to sleep, Tori!" Bulma said, and left the room. The others soon followed, going to their own rooms for the night. Tori listened to doors shutting and whispers and finally silence. She looked outside and saw that the sky was lightening. Sighing, she sat down on the sofa and pulled the blanket Chi Chi had given her up over her bare shoulders. She leaned back and closed her eyes. The world was still spinning.  
  
Suddenly she snapped her eyes open again and realized that she'd fallen alseep, and it took a moment for everything to come back into focus before she realized that she'd somehow turned herself around on the sofa so that her head was hanging upside-down over the edge. She wondered why everything was topsy-turvy.  
  
Then she came to the sudden realization that she wasn't alone in the room. Her eyes traveled upwards from brown shoes to turban-swathed frowning head and finally realized who she was looking at. She blinked and smiled; "Hiya Piccolo. What's up?"  
  
"Shouldn't you be alseep?" He said, intead of returning her greeting. She looked ridiculous in her current position and started to tell her so, but she fell over and landed in a graceless heap on the floor instead, "You."  
  
"Shh!" Tori sat upright, grinning up at him, "Don't wanna disturb the others.c'mere.I wanna show you something."  
  
"Tori, you shou."  
  
"Shhh!" She said, louder, "Just come here. Please."  
  
What are you doing? She asked herself, you can't be able to do what I think your about to do.Tori! You made a promise that you would never show that to anyone! Stop this before it's too late! Her inner voice screamed at her, but she told it to go suck a lemon, and turned to Piccolo, who was now seated on the floor in front of her, curious despite of himself.  
  
"Watch!" She said, and focused on a row of decorative candles set above the fireplace mantle. Piccolo became aware of some shifting in the air currents and realized the tempature was rising, Tori's eyes took on a farway gaze, and suddenly, without warning, all seven candles on the mantle were lit as if by some invisible hand, but at the same time.  
  
Piccolo raised an eye-ridge, but was silent, observing her.  
  
"You can't tell anyone!" She cried, her eyes wide with fear, "Last time I did anything.like that.I got grounded for a month!"  
  
"But, why?" He asked, honestly perplexed, "You should be encouraged to use and perfect your power, not punished."  
  
"Tell that to my folks." She muttered, and then looked over at him, shrugging, "Not many people understand pyrokenesis.that's what it's called, you know, I looked it up, once.and I've seen 'Carrie' half a million times. Only, it's not as easy as they make it seem in the movies. It really does hurt.here." She touched the side of her head, "But one thing was true, sometimes it's hard to control."  
  
"You need to learn to manipulate your ki better." He said, "Then you won't be afraid of losing control."  
  
"I'm always afraid of losing control." She whispered, strangly sober as using her power often makes her, "I doubt anything will ever change that."  
  
"You'd be surprised."  
  
"Maybe."  
  
He stood up and looked at the candles, Tori felt something, like a tickle in the back of her head, and suddenly all the candles she's lit were snuffed out. "Go to sleep now." He lifted a hand and touched his forehead, vanishing from sight. She shrugged and wondered what, exactly, made her open herself up that way to him when she barely even knew him! She would not even had thought twice about not showing her power to the women, what made her show him? She shook her head, uncertain and curled up on the sofa, not understanding herself in the least.  
  
"At least he didn't laugh at me." She said, to herself before falling asleep. 


	8. A Curse Or A Gift?

Tori knew she shouldn't have used her pyrokenesis, she tossed on the sofa, kicking the covers to the floor, falling in and out of nightmares like a drowning victim rising and then plunging headlong into the darkness of the ocean, pulled down by their own fear and helplessness.  
  
She did not realize that she had been moving about so fitfully, in her mind were images of terror and pain she could not fathom where they came from. All she knew was that she felt in the grasp of some unspeakable horror and it was all she could do to struggled away from it in her sleep.  
  
"Tori!" She moaned, hearing someone call her name, it sounded so far away, from over rolling hills perhaps, She wondered, in that small spark of herself that still had conherent thought, if it were not just another aspect of the nightmare, "Tori!"  
  
She became aware of hands on her shoulders, shaking her, not roughly, but it enough force to cause her head to whip back and forth. She raised her hands to fend off her attacker and, still cause in the throes of her dream, lashed out blindly at whoever it was that was trying to rouse her.  
  
She heard a sharp intake of breath and then someone slapped her hard across the face, waking her instantly. She blinked, holding one hand to her stinging cheek, and struggled to remove the cobwebs from her mind, she shook her head in confusion, uncertain where she was at first.  
  
Then she remembered. Bulma. The slumber party. Piccolo. Her gaze darted to the candles atop the mantle. The candles.  
  
"You've got a night right hook there." She looked up and saw Vegeta floating a few inches from her, rubbing his jaw, "But, I wouldn't think trying to wake you from a bad dream would warrant such treatment."  
  
"Oh! You.." She faltered, realizing what must have happened, "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to.Thank you..."  
  
She realized how stupid she must sound, and sighed, standing up and walking towards the kitchen. She was still a bit shaky and held onto the blanket to hide her near nudity, since she realized that she'd not bothered to get dressed or back into her night clothes after the strip poker game.  
  
"What are you doing?" She started as he came up behind her, she hadn't realized that one could be so silent, She was looking through the cupboards in search of something, "If your hungry, there's food in the fridge."  
  
Her stomach turned at the thought of food. She shook her head and said; "I just want some tea. Do you have any tea?"  
  
"How am I soppose to know?" He snapped, "Do I look like Martha Stewart to you?"  
  
"Nevermind." She said, "I'll find it myself, if you guys even have any.Ah! Here we are."  
  
"Well, since you woke me up," He said, "I may as well start the day."  
  
"Sure." She said, dropping the teabag into a cup of water and shoving the whole thing into the microwave, "Have a good day." She said, absently, still lost in her own thoughts. Vegeta made a noise something akin to a snort and a growl and left her. The sun was coming up. She checked her watch and saw that it was about six in the morning. Everyone else, save for Vegeta, were still abed and she did not wish to wake them. The microwave made the customary dinging sound and she took her tea from it, dumped in about two teaspoons ful of sugar and stirred it with a spoon taken from a drawer.  
  
She carried it outside, out back, and saw down on the dew-damped grass near the little fishpond. She pulled her blanket tighter about her shoulders and held the cup of fragrent liquid under her nose, enjoying the scent and feel of the tendrils of steam that rose to tickle her nose. She lowered the cup and held it in her hands, knowing that to drink it right away would be to risk scalding her tongue, and instead watched the ripples of the pond, the lanquid movement somehow relaxed her and made her feel at peace with herself.  
  
Tori did not know percisely how long she had sat there, holding the cup of steadily cooling tea in her hands and gazing out at the fishpond, but she became aware of someone watching her and slowly came out of her reverie with an inward sigh. She turned slightly and saw Piccolo not far behind her, floating, actually, in the same posision she'd seen him in a few times since her arrival yesterday night.  
  
"Your up early." She said, taking a sip of her tea, she winced, too much sugar, and set the cup down beside her.  
  
"The same could be said for you." He said by way of answering her, she shrugged, and said; "Vegeta woke me."  
  
Piccolo did not say anything but floated down and sat beside her on the grass, not minding the wetness of the morning dew and waited. After a few moments passed between them, Tori said; "Do you ever get nightmares?"  
  
"I see disturbing imagery in my mediations.sometimes." He said, slowly, not sure if that was what she meant.  
  
"No, I mean..." She paused, stumbled, unsure, she shook her head, "I don't know."  
  
"Are they bad?" He asked, sensing her need to talk, but not knowing exactly how to go about it.  
  
She sighed, nodded and said; still gazing at the ripples in the pond, "I only have them after I've used my power.I don't know why.Sometimes." Her voice falterd, became small, even with his sensitive hearing, Piccolo had to strain her hear her, "Sometimes I think my power is a curse."  
  
"It's not a curse, Tori." He said, reaching out to cup her chin in his hand, turning her face towards his, forcing her to look into his ebony eyes, "You just need to learn how to better control it. Then the nightmares will leave you. But, it's not a curse." "If only I could believe that." She said, "If only."  
  
"You will." Piccolo said, releasing her face and standing up, she was amazed at exactly how large he was, all strength and muscle but she felt that his greatest strength did not lay in his physical body at all. "Trust in yourself."  
  
She did not answer, only turned back to the fishpond, watching the tiny ripples as the fish darted back and forth beneath the surface. One dived upwards, snatching a careless fly who had buzzed too near the water, Piccolo was gone by the time it had vanished back beneath the water, hapless fly and all. 


	9. Trouble!

He looked at the card he held in his hand. It was an identification card. Her face in the photo looked young and happy, the typical teenager. Her blonde hair held back in a ponytail which fell over one shoulder, her blue eyes sparkling even in the photograph. He grinned to himself, reading the address printed in black lettering next to the photo.  
  
"Time to have that bit of fun that was denied us, honey." He said to the girl's photo before stuffing the card back into his pant's pocket. "It was lucky for me that I spotted this after you dropped it last night."  
  
He ran a hand over his greasy black hair and laughed, walking towards his friend's house to let him in the deal. They would call Eddie from there, he's never forgive them if he was left out. Oh, yeah, he thought, as the sun slowly showed her face in the sky, you're gonna pay, Tori.  
  
He came to his friend's house and knocked breifly on the door of the run down shack-like house. He didn't bother to close the gate he'd just walked through, it was falling off it's hinges anyway. In fact, the whole yard was in a horrible state of disrepair. The door opened and a woman stood there, wrapped in a ratty bathrobe and sucking on a foul-smelling cigarette.  
  
"What'cha want, Doug?" She coughed, and Doug waved the smoke out of his eyes, those things could kill a body, he thought in disgust.  
  
"Carl home?" He asked, figeting on the front stoop, wanting to get past Doug's mother as quickly as possible. The old lady gave him the creeps.  
  
"Down stairs." She said, moving aside so that he could enter and walk past her, "Don't go getting into no trouble, ya hear?"  
  
"Sure." He said, adding under his breath; "Screw you, ya witch."  
  
"What was that?" She asked, coming up behind him before he could open the basement door which led to his friend's room. "Nothing."  
  
"That's what I thought." He could tell she was walking away not by the sound of her footsteps but by the smell of her smoking becoming fainter. Oh, he could still smell the smoke, the whole house and all it's funiture were just soaked in smoke, but at least he couldn't smell fresh smoke anymore. If smoke could be described as fresh.  
  
"Carl!" He called, taking the steps two by two, "Call Eddie! Tell him to get his fat ass over here!"  
  
He stood at the end of Carl's bed, not bothering to notice the posters of scantily clad women and rock and roll posters tacked on all the walls of his friend's room. A stack of porn mags lay in a haphazard pile next to his bed, more than a few hardcore bondage fetish magizines stuffed in among the more tame glossy airbrushed playboy-like ones. He knew his friend had some issues, but he had a strict code of live and let live. Each to his own, so to speak.  
  
Carl was laying on his bed, a pair of headphones over his short dishwater blonde-haired head, some sort of metal band playing through his 'phones. He rolled over and slipped them off his head. "Why, Doug?" He asked, "What's up?"  
  
"Oh, nothing." He grinned like a chesire cat, taking the photo i.d card from his pocket and tossing it to his friend, "What say we all have some fun tonight?"  
  
Understanding slowly dawned on Carl as he studied the card, he looked up and smiled, already reaching for the telephone which was buried under a mound of dirty clothes in the corner of the room.  
  
"Why wait for tonight?" Carl asked, "It's still early, not many people will be up...besides, I'm feeling restless..."  
  
"What if someone sees?"  
  
"Who cares?" He said, "You know ain't no one's gonna do anything. Everyone pretty much minds their own business, or haven't you noticed that yet? Besides, no one wants trouble."  
  
It took about twenty mintues for their friend to show up. They told Carl's mother that they were going to get some beer and would be back after a bit. She grumbled something they couldn't quite understand from her place on the sofa where she parked herself most days and watched her television set. She seemed to enjoy living her life through the television as it droined on and on rather than getting out and experiencing life for herself. She was reaching into her pack for another cigarette when the door slammed shut on her son and his hoodlum friends.  
  
Tori used the shower and got dressed. She gathered her things together and was about to tell them all thanks but that she needed to get back home to watch her little brother and sister before her mother came looking for her. Her father had to leave for work at eight and she needed to be there to help with the housework and getting April and Todd fed and taken care of. Even though, at fourteen, April could pretty much take care of herself.  
  
"Why don't you at least stay for breakfast?" Chi Chi asked, as she broke some eggs into a bowl and added milk, stirring the mixture, "I'm making omlettes and frying up some bacon."  
  
"I'd like to, but."  
  
"Nonsence!" Bulma said, as she combed her blue hair and looked at herself in her compact mirror, she sat on one of the stools surrounding the bar- like counter off the kitchen, "It's Saturday, surely your family won't mind if you're a little late."  
  
"Well, Let me call first," Tori said, reaching for the phone, she dialed and spoke briefly to her little brother, who was up watching cartoons, as was normal for a Saturday morning at her house. She could even heard the cereal he was crunching and thought that April must have poured it for him.  
  
"I told my little brother to tell my Mom that I'd be a bit late." She said, smiling as she hung up the phone, she really didn't want to leave just yet, and Chi Chi's breakfast did smell good. She heard the front door open and shut and Goku, Vegeta and Gohan came into the room, no doubt lured there by the smell of the bacon frying and the eggs cooking.  
  
Tori smiled at them as they found places to sit and Chi Chi dished up the food. She ate slow, savoring the food, as was her way, but couldn't help being amazed at how fast Goku was putting away the food, she raised her eyebrows in wonder at his seventh helping and felt a bit sorry for poor Chi Chi who had to feed his monsterous apitite.  
  
"Enjoying yourself?" She asked, as he stuffed away the last of his eggs, he looked up at her with his mouth full and she broke out into peals of laughter, "You look like your having fun, there, Goku."  
  
He nodded, chewed, swallowed and grinned at her, "Sure am! I love breakfast!"  
  
"He loves lunch and dinner and between meal snacks as well." Bulma said, laughing, "But, Chi Chi! These omlettes are wonderful! Your such a great cook!"  
  
"Thank you, Bulma," Chi Chi blushed, turning towards the sink to wash her hands, "I'm glad you like them."  
  
"Where's Piccolo?" Tori asked, as she helped Chi Chi with the dishes, "I haven't seen him in a while." "Oh, he comes and goes as he pleases, Tori." Chi Chi said, "It's just his way. He'll show up eventually."  
  
"Oh." She said, taking a dish from Chi Chi and lifting a towel to dry it off before placing it in the cupboard overhead. She did this without thinking, the action so familiar to her from washing and drying all the sinkfuls of dishes back home, "I really had fun last night, Chi Chi, maybe I can come over again next weekend?"  
  
"Sure, sweetie." Chi Chi said, smiling at her from the sink, her arms up to her elbows covered in soap suds, "Come over any time, you're always welcome."  
  
"Thanks!" She said, and the women grew quiet, but it was a comfortable silence which passed between as they finished cleaning the kitchen together.  
  
Tori wandered outside after the kitchen was done and stood looking trees growing in close bunches behind the house. She did not realize exactly why she'd never noticed it before, but there was a building far off past the lawn and trees, a rather large building and she was curious in spite of herself.  
  
Walking across the lawn and through the trees, she came to the building and paused before the door, recalling that old tale about the hapless cat and it's curiosity. Shrugging she pulled open the door.  
  
"What.the.?!" She heard someone yell, it sounded like Vegeta, and suddenly someone jumped on her and threw her to the ground. A tree exploded behind her.  
  
"What the hell were you thinking?!" Vegeta yelled, as she realized it had been Piccolo who'd pushed her down in time to save her from sharing the fate of the smoldering tree, "You could have been killed!"  
  
"Sorry!" She cried, standing up and dusting herself off, she didn't want to look at tree for then the reality of how close she'd come would hit her full force and she didn't want to think about that at the moment, she wasn't sure her heart could take it. "I was just curious about this place and."  
  
"We were training." Piccolo spoke then, and turned to Vegeta, "I was under the impression that door was to remain locked throughout. Is something wrong with it?"  
  
"I'm not sure." Vegeta said, studying the door, "Bulma told me that it's soppose to automatically lock from the inside, so I don't see how."  
  
"Well, it was unlocked." Tori said, "Obviously or I wouldn't have been able to open it, right?"  
  
"I'll have Bulma take a look at it." Vegeta said, to Piccolo he added, "Let's get back to work." "If you don't mind," Tori said, "I'd like to stay and watch." That trick with the tree intrigued her and she wanted to know more about these people and what they could do.  
  
"No way!" Vegeta shook his head, "It's too dangerous for a girl! Go back to the house and help Chi Chi clean or Bulma do her hair or something."  
  
Tori glared at him and started to open her mouth with a retort she knew would be scathing when Piccolo came to her defense. "Let her stay." He said, "She might learn something." 


	10. Saturday Morning Cartoons

"Shh! Stay with me!" Doug whispered to his two friends, who were directly behind him, keeping to the shadows, or at least, the less lit areas as it was becoming lighter and lighter as morning continued to decend. They were on the side of the house, Eddie held a gun in one hand, a gift from his old man before he'd passed away a few years ago. He held it up like he'd seen cops do on those television programs he was so fond of. If he didn't like kicking peoples asses and just plain violence on his part so much, Eddie might have gone into the academy.  
  
"Are you sure this is her house?" Carl asked, behind Eddie, he didn't want to accidently get shot, he knew his friend was a bit loose with the trigger.  
  
"Yeah, positive." Doug said, "That's what her i.d. card said anyway and it's a new card too."  
  
"So, what are we gonna do?" Carl asked, "Just grab her and run?"  
  
"Naw, man." Eddie laughed, a sound like nails rubbing together, Carl winced, "That's too easy. Doug here's feeling vengeful, ain't ya? Gonna make her pay, huh, Dougy?"  
  
Doug did not answer, he could hear the television on inside the house as they came up to the back door, cartoons from the sound of it. He paused, holding one hand up to silence his friends, who were both prone to fall into loud laughter and talk. He listened and heard a child's voice, muffled, followed by a woman's. He did not hear a man's voice nor had he seen a car in the driveway. He thought maybe the husband, if there was one, had left for work all ready.  
  
That was just fine with him. He smiled and motioned for Eddie to break the window. Eddie raised the weapon and used it to smash the glass in. He didn't even flinch when the glass cut into his hand, smearing his blood along the jagged edges of the broken window.  
  
He reached through and unlocked the door, shoving it open for his friends. They paused for a moment in the kitchen, getting their bearings. Doug, their unofficial leader, raised an eyebrow and motioned for them to follow him with a slight incline of his head. "Wait!" He whispered, "We should split up. Be easier to take care of things."  
  
"Good idea." Carl nodded, "Anything goes?"  
  
Eddie grinned, one of his teeth was rotten and black, it looked like a small hole in his smile, Doug could all ready heard his brain working overtime thinking about the chaos he was about to cause. It was almost like a drug to him, Doug thought, Eddie's not hooked on crack or pcp but on hurting others. The more the hurt, the higher Eddie seemed to get. It was a bit disturbing to say the least. But Eddie did come in handy during certain situations.  
  
Carl found Mrs. Lawson in the bedroom making her and her husband's bed. He watched her from the hallway just outside the door for a moment, taking in her slender form, rounded in just the right areas. Her golden hair was cut short to her shoulders and bouced when she walked. He watched her ass move as she bent down to tuck a corner of the sheet under the mattress.  
  
Suddenly, a scream. Shrill and childlike. Carl groaned as he realized one of them had came upon the kids.  
  
"Mommy!"  
  
Mrs. Lawson jerked upright, gasping, she spun around; "April?!"  
  
She screamed when she saw Doug lounging against the doorjam, "Hiya Mrs. Lawson. Nice day we're having, ain't it?" He bowed mockingly towards her as she backed away, looking around desperatly for a weapon, any kind of weapon. "What's the matter? Can't you be polite and say hello to your company? After me and my friends walked all the way over here to pay you and you're a visit.really! What can the world be coming to?"  
  
He made a tsking sound with his tongue and lunged at the woman without warning, catching her around the waist, shoving her down to the floor. He heard a loud thudding sound and realized that she'd hit her head on the hardwood floor. She cried out and he put his hand over her mouth to keep her quiet. Her blue eyes, wide with fear, stared up at him above his hand, pleading with him in silence to let her go.not to hurt her.  
  
"Are you going to be quiet now, Mrs. Lawson?" He asked, speaking to like she was a little girl or a retard, "Nod your head for yes, Mrs. Lawson."  
  
Of course she nodded. He knew she would. No one liked to be forcefully silenced. It was humilating. He removed his hand. She started to beg. He sighed, he knew she'd do that as well. It was so annoying when they begged.  
  
"P-please! Don't hurt my children! D-do anything.take anything you want.j- just don't hurt my children! Please!" "I really hate doing this," He said, before he hit her with a open fist across the face. She went down swiftly. She looked up, holding her hand over her cheek, which was red from his hand. "I hate when people waste my time."  
  
In the living room Carl and Eddie had met up, after discovering the only other people in the house besides Tori's mother were her younger brother and sister. They faced the two children. A girl who looked like a minature version of the girl they'd been about to have fun with the night before and a small, tow-headed boy who held onto the girl's hand and stood a bit behind her.  
  
She had one arm protectively around the little boy's shoulders and backed up until the back of her thigh touched the television set. She screamed again for her mother, but there was no answer. Her heart pounded in her chest and she didn't know what to do.  
  
"Shh!" Eddie said, pointing the gun at them, "Shut up, girl! If you know what's good for you, you and your little brother will be quiet!"  
  
"Eddie!" Carl said, glancing at his friend, "Put the gun away. They're just a couple of kids."  
  
"She needs to shut that screaming up!" He yelled, his gun hand shaking, "She needs to shut it before I shut it for her!"  
  
"Eddie! Knock it off, man!" Carl said, "I mean it. Your scaring me!"  
  
"Screw you!" Eddie said, as the girl continued to scream in fear. The sound was really starting to get to him, Eddie waved the gun in the air, screaming above the girl's voice for her to shut the hell up. "Your giving me a splitting headach! Shut up!"  
  
She did not. The boy started crying, adding his wails to his sister's screams. Eddie had had enough. Watching in horror, Carl couldn't believe what he was seeing. Without warning Eddie steadied his hand and pointed the gun at the girl's head. From such a short distance the shot would be easy as pie to make, Carl knew.  
  
He grabbed Eddie's arm, jerking him away, "What the hell are you doing, man? They're just kids!"  
  
"Fuck off!" Eddie yelled, shoving Carl backwards so hard the other man fell against a bookshelf and books rained down on his head. He heard the sharp crack of the gun as it went off. He looked up from where he'd fallen to see Eddie standing over the little girl, who had fallen on top of her brother, as if she had wanted to shield him from the madman's gun.  
  
"Oh my god.oh my god.oh my god." Carl said over and over, staring at the blood beginning to pool and sink into the pale carpeted floor beneath the girl's body. The boy had scrambled out from under his sister and looked at her in shock, as if he didn't believe what he was seeing. Eddie raised his hand again and aimed at the boy. Carl shouted something.it might have been a protest, but Eddie didn't hear him. Bits of bone, blood and brain splattered the wall and dripped down over Bugs Bunny's happy, carrot-eating face on the screen of the television as the boy fell across his sister's body, dead before he'd even fallen.  
  
Carl looked at Eddie in disbelief. He'd known his friend was unstable. He's had no idea just how bad. He'd never thought it would come to this. They were just kids, for God's sake! Just kids!  
  
"They were just kids, Eddie." He said in a whisper, his heart beating like a rabbits, "My God, man.what were you thinking?"  
  
"She woudn't shut up!" He yelled, realizing what he'd just done, "She wouldn't shut up, Carl! I had to do it! I had to! And the boy would tell! He would tell! I couldn't let him tell on me, I had to do it, Carl! I had to! I had to!" He dropped the gun and it landed with a muffled clunk on the carpeted floor before he crumpled to the ground, shaking. He'd never killed anyone before.  
  
Carl held his friend as he shook and sobbed, not knowing what to do. He had no idea that it would go down like this when he'd agreed to go on this little escapade. He'd not signed up for any killing. That was for damned sure. Besides, the girl they'd come to find hadn't even been here. How could they be sure, even now, that this was even the right house?  
  
"The woman wouldn't co-operate." Doug said, entering the room behind them, "He was ajusting his pants and had fresh scratched across the sides of his face. "I accidently bashed her head a bit to hard into the headboard of her bed. Poor thing, went down like a bag of.holy.! Doug! Eddie! I hear the gun go off but I just thought."  
  
"What?" Carl asked, "That they were waring shots?"  
  
Doug shook his head, "Oh, shit, man.shit.We gotta get out of here.We gotta go, man.!"  
  
"Calm the fuck down!" Carl yelled, and slapped Eddie, who's started to cry, "We can handle this. Just.just calm down.Let me think! Fuck!"  
  
"I can't go to jail, Carl!" Eddie yelled, tears streaming down his face, "You know what they do to guys like me in jail! You know what they do?!"  
  
Guys who murder kids, Eddie meant. They didn't fair so well in the prision system. Carl almost felt sorry for his friend. If he hadn't glanced at the small, broken bodies of the two innocent kids who didn't deserve to be shot and killed in cold blood while still in their pajamas on a Saturday morning when all they cared about was which cartoon was gonna be on next, he might have actually felt sorry for his friend. "We'll burn the house down." Carl said suddenly, "And start with the bodies so that.so that." He faltered, he didn't know why he wanted to start with the bodies, it just seemed to make a kind of insane sense to him. "Like a funeral pyre." He finished lamely.  
  
"I'll go look for something to use in the garage." Doug said, "Gas or something."  
  
Meanwhile.  
  
She sat in a small room above the main battle area, out of harm's way, yet still able to see everything going on through the unbreakable glass of the window she was peering through. She could hear everything through two-way speakers situated on the walls and watched with interest as the two fighters continued with their training.  
  
Piccolo looked to be having the upper hand, it seemd to her. She watched as they threw fiery blasts at each other that shook the walls and make her stomach lurch and her palms sweaty.  
  
Suddenly, without warning, images from a nightmare she'd thought left behind in the darkness of the previous night flashed behind her mind's eye and a stabbing pain erupted behind her eyes. She screamed and fell to the floor, holding her hands over her head, still seeing those awful images.they would not leave her! And the pain was blinding her.  
  
She heard the door open and felt hands on her shoulders, shaking her gently; "Tori! What's wrong? We heard you scream."  
  
She looked up through her splayed fingers at Piccolo's green face, his eyes wide with worry, still shaking her. Tears fell from her eyes and he was shocked at their color. Red. Blood was seeping from the corners of her eyes and out one nostril of her nose. She said in a shaking voice; "They won't go away.They won't go away."  
  
"What won't?" Vegeta asked from behind Piccolo, "What's she talking about? What's the matter with her?" He sounded more annoyed than concerned, though there was a hint of worry in his voice.  
  
"They're dead." She said, "They're dead.No..no.no..no..!" She went on, shaking, on and on until it became a chant. She saw nothing but her own inner demons, the knives stabbing, stabbing, stabbing behind her eyes, the pain becoming almost second nature.she sobbed as visions of her mother and siblings, fallen and bloody, in a small pile, burning like so much trash played in all it's stark detail behind her eyes.  
  
"What is she talking about?" Vegeta asked, "Who's dead? She's not making any sense!"  
  
"I don't know!" Piccolo snapped, "Tori! Stop it! Calm down and talk to us! Tori!"  
  
"She can't hear you." Vegeta said as Tori became strangly silent. She stared ahead but seemed blind, she did not respond to questions either. "She's gone into shock." 


	11. Tori's Rage

The damp towel on her forehead dripped cool liquid over her eyes, to drip down her face and into the cleavage of her blouse. Tori had not stirred since Piccolo and Vegeta had bore her back to the main house, laying her down on the sofa while Chi Chi fussed over her.  
  
"What happened to her?" Bulma asked, chewing on her bottem lip as she looked down on the girl on the sofa, "Why does she look so pale?"  
  
"I'm not sure." Piccolo said, watching Chi Chi dip the rag into the bowl of water on the floor next to the sofa and hold it over Tori's head once more, "She seemed to have some kind of.vision."  
  
"She mentioned something about someone being dead." Vegeta said, taking Bulma's hand in his own absently. He pulled her close to his side as he looked at Chi Chi and Tori.  
  
Tori had begun to wake a bit. She did not move but felt others around her and the softness of the sofa beneath her so she knew she was not longer on the hard floor. She felt and smelled the water dripping down over her face and Chi Chi's faint perfume as she held the washclothe over her face.  
  
Her eyes fluttered a bit and she forced them open. It was no use just laying there pretending to be asleep, she thought, that won't make things go away or back to the way they were. She looked up at the worried faces of these people she'd only just met and who had, after only such a short time, had come to care for and like her. It was more than could be said for many of her own highschool friends who'd know her most of her life.  
  
"Are you okay, Tori?" She looked near the edge of the sofa and saw Chi Chi's little son Gohan standing there. He must have just showed up because she did not remember seeing him when she first opened her eyes, "What happened?"  
  
"I." She began and then faltered, she did not recount her visions to a little boy and risk frightening him, or at the very least, giving him nightmares, "I.fell." She finished lamely.  
  
She sat up and swung her legs over the side of the sofa, standing up swiftly. Her thoughts were all focused on her family and she knew she had to get to them. She brushed her flaxen hair from her eyes and looked around her her jacket and overnight bag. When she didn't see them she shrugged and told herself they didn't matter. Only getting home mattered.  
  
But someone grabbed her arm and pulled her back. She turned to see Goku. She shook her head. He hadn't been there a moment ago. No matter, she thought, I have to get home. I have to!  
  
"Tori, wait." He said, "Tell us what you saw.what happened?"  
  
"My family." She said, and felt the warm in her viens growing hotter as she spoke, "Something's happened to my family."  
  
Goku realized that something strange was happening. The flesh beneath his hand grew warmer and warmer as the room's tempature began to rise. He let go of her and noticed that he sliding glass doors which led to the back of the house, were fogging up. "Something's happened." Tori said, though by now everyone was wondering about the heat, "I have to go to them."  
  
"It might be dangerous!" Piccolo stepped in front of her, meaning to block her path and keep her safe, "Tori!"  
  
"I need to get to them!" Tori yelled, not really seeing, only feeling, "Get out of my way!"  
  
"Tori.?"  
  
Bulma screamed as she saw Piccolo's cape go up in a sudden rush of flame. Flame that had not been there before. He wasn't hurt. He'd pulled it off and stomped out the fire before it had time to spread, but they were looking at Tori now, with a mixture of awe tinged fear and just a bit of.understanding? Tori didn't care. She shoved past them and ran towards the door.  
  
She had to get home! She thought, even as the wave of heat followed in her wake, glass windows broke with a shattering sound, flying razor-sharp shards of glass behind her, barely missing her. Vases and dishes, other bric-a-brac exploded behind her, though she seemed obvious to it all.  
  
She heard someone scream and had she turned at that moment she would have seen Chi Chi with her hand over her face, covering a nasty jagged wound from one of the shards of glass from a window that had sliced her cheek, blood dripping over her fingers as she tried to hold the wound closed.  
  
"Chi Chi!" Goku cried out, taking his wife in his arms and leading her towards the bathroom, "It's not deep. That's good."  
  
"What.did she do this?" Chi Chi asked, her voice starting to rise to panic, "What is she, Goku? No human girl could do.what she's doing.!"  
  
Goku shook his head, but Bulma said; "Someone needs to go after her! She'll hurt herself!" No one had to voice what she really meant. "She'll hurt others!" She started to pull out of Vegeta's grip but he held her tighter, shaking his head at her, "Don't. You can't help her."  
  
"But."  
  
"Stay here!" He said to her as he followed Piccolo outside, they would go after the girl themselves and hopefully get her to calm down enough that no one would be hurt.badly.  
  
Tori knew they were behind her. She also knew enough to curb her rage, at least for the moment, and pull her power back into herself. She felt the blistering heat and sweat began to bead on her forehead as she did so. She hated having to pull the fire back into herself. She knew she ran the risk of burning hersself up. The thought was enough to make her cold with fear. She ran blindly down the street, trying to get to her house.  
  
Vegeta and Piccolo kept pace in the air overhead, keeping her in sight. Suddenly, without warning, Piccolo sped up and landed in front of her. Vegeta paused in mid-flight to look down at the sence below, wondering what was to happen next.  
  
"Tori," Piccolo grabbed her shoulders and forced her still, she looked straight ahead, at a finger of smoke rising above the rooftops, "Stop. Look at me. You have to stop!"  
  
"I can't!" She cried, her eyes riveted on the smoke, now more and more of it was filling the noon-day sky with darkness that made her eyes water and her throat scratchy, she coughed and tried to push past Piccolo, "Let me go! I have to get home!"  
  
Piccolo did not let her go. He held her still even as sirens were heard not to far away. They were only a block away from the fire, he knew, and he also knew that there were dead. Tori watched in silence as the fire trucks, four, one right after the other sped down the street and screeched to a halt outside the house she knew was too far gone to be saved.  
  
A policeman approached them, raising an eyebrow at Vegeta, but not saying anything about the man in the sky above them. Instead, he focused on Piccolo and Tori. "Do you know who lives here, Miss?"  
  
Piccolo let her go and she turned towards the police officer, looking past him to the inferno that was her house, "Y-yes." She said, "I.live.here."  
  
"Who's that?" Another officer yelled over, and his partner replied; "The daughter, the older one, I think."  
  
"M-my family." Tori began, swallowed and tried once more; "T-they aren't." The aren't dead, are they? She'd wanted to asked, but could not make the words appear on her tongue. It was as if by saying it, aloud, now that she was actually here to see the damage, would make it be true. And she never wanted it to be true. Never.  
  
".so sorry, Miss." The police officer was speaking but she was barely hearing him, his words were lame, meaningless afterall, and they did her no good. Nothing would. ".bodies too burned.father."  
  
"What?" She asked, blinking the smoke out of her eyes, she looked at the officer once more, "What about my father?"  
  
"He tried to stop the fire." He said, trying his best to look symphethic, "There was nothing anyone could do. I'm sorry."  
  
"Who did this?" She asked through clentched teeth, her hands balled into fists at her sides, she screamed; "Who did this?!!"  
  
The officer shook his head, "We.we are running an investigation.but."  
  
"Not good enough!" She cried, not caring that the tears were making it hard to see things clearly, "I want to know who killed my family. I have to know!"  
  
"Even if we knew, Miss Lawson." He said, "I would have to seriously consider before revealing such information.no offence, but the last thing we need is a revenge-hungry teenager out there making our jobs harder."  
  
Tori glared at the officer, but said nothing. She would find who was responsible herself. Even if it took her the rest of her life. Without bothering to see if they followed, she spun around and started back towards the only place she could call home, if they would let her stay, now. Her heart felt like a piece of cold lead in her chest, every beat a painful reminder that she was alive while those she had loved more than life itself were now gone.  
  
Someone would pay. 


	12. Pain and Sorrow

Bulma closed the door behind her, carrying the tray of food that hadn't even been touched. She sighed and turned to face her friend, who stood nearby with a look of concern and sorrow across her pretty face.  
  
"How much longer will she continue this way, Chi Chi?" Bulma asked, looking at the untouched food, "She hasn't eaten a thing in three days. She's wasting away.I can't bear to see her like this."  
  
"She's had a tough time." Chi Chi said, shaking her head, "Losing her family that way.We just have to keep trying and be understanding.she'll come around." "I hope so." Bulma said, moving past her to take the tray back into the kitchen, "I hope so."  
  
Tori lay in the large bed that Chi Chi and Goku had given up for her. She felt guilty for that, somewhere deep inside her where she could still feel. She knew they had taken the sofa and loveseat in the livingroom, however uncomfortable that was, so that she could have the bed.  
  
She stared up at the ceiling, unblinking, unthinking and numb. The numbness felt like a godsend. She did not wish to feel anything at all. She watched the sunlight play along the walls and the shadows grow deeper as each day drew to a close. The ache in her stomach begging for nourishment was a welcome alternate to the pain in her heart. As long as she was hungry, she couldn't feel anything else. Therefor, she'd refused to eat.  
  
But, her mind would not completely close down. She kept seeing the flames and smelling the smoke and when she slept and dreamed those dreams were more often than not nightmares of her little brother and sister screaming for her to help them and her mother crying out her name while her just looked on an on with a mixture of sadness and disapointment in his eyes as he looked at her.  
  
She tried to reach them, in her nightmares, but it was as if they were calling out for her from beyond a large canyon and no matter how she strained and screamed she could not reach them. She woke pounding the bed, hot tears streaming down her cheeks from these night images. She was releived when the nightmares began to cease at last and she just fell into dreamless blackness when she slept.  
  
She wanted revenge. There was still a part of her that had not given in to her body's desire for emptiness. She wanted to make someone pay for killing her family. She would make someone pay. But, she thought, later.when it stopped hurting so much.She closed her eyes lest they betray her by tearing up again. She had heard Bulma leave with the tray of food she had refused to even look at and was startled out of her reverie by the sound of the bedroom door clicking open once more.  
  
"I'm not hungry." She said, softly, turning her back on the door, she did not even wish to see who it was, if it was not the kind, normally outgoing blue haired woman, "Please, leave me."  
  
"I can't do that, Tori." She turned around when she heard his voice and watched as he stood over her, "You have to stop this.this nonsense."  
  
"Nonsense!" She cried, "My family was."  
  
"Yes they are dead, Tori." Piccolo said, arms crossed over his chest, "But you aren't. Your alive and I think they'd want you to continue to be so. But you'll be dead soon too, if you don't stop this."  
  
"What do you know?" She crossed her own arms over her chest in stubborn anger, What do any of them know?  
  
"I know more than you think." He said, sitting down on the edge of her bed, "Tori, I know it's hard. I know it hurts. But, you can't give up."  
  
"Why not?" She said, sitting slightly behind him to the side.  
  
He looked at her. His eyes hard. Harder than she'd seen them in the short time she's known him. "Because. You said yourself. They need to pay for what they did. You are the only one who can do that, Tori."  
  
Tori was silent, weighing his words. They were the same words she herself had been saying over and over to herself. She turned away for a moment. When she turned back her eyes held the same hardness she'd seen in his, with a flicker of something else. Determination?  
  
"Will you help me?" She asked, knowing she'd need all the help she could get, "Please?"  
  
Piccolo smiled, "First, you have to start eating again."  
  
She nodded.  
  
"Then, when your strength returns," He went on, "We'll start training."  
  
She nodded again. 


	13. Focusing Her Ki

The weeks had passed much quickly than she would have thought possible. She had regained her strength, having a new purpose, however grim, to continue on. Though it was hard, her body ached in places she hadn't even known exsisted before each night that she fell asleep and she was often awoken in the night not by nightmares but by cramps from protesting muscles not used to being used so much!  
  
She knew, no matter how difficult the training that Piccolo put her through, she would not give up. She could not give up. She felt deep in her heart of hearts that something, something more than just vengence for her family, had brought her to these people. She felt, that even had nothing at all happened to her family that she would have, eventually, found herself being trained by this great, silence and powerful fighter.  
  
Tori stood near the fishpond. The light of the day was fading fast and she was watching the purple-pink streaks of light across the horizon with what seemed to her like a new pair of eyes. Before, she would have simply noticed the pretty colours and left it at that.  
  
Now, however, she saw other things within the colors, feelings and, although she would have been embarraced to say aloud, some kind of sound that was nearly musical. She watched the sunset with as much interest as anyone else might have watched a popular television series, a slight smile upon her lips and reflected in her baby blue eyes. Even though she was engrossed in the wonderful vista she did not fail to sense his approach.  
  
"Tori." Piccolo spoke her name and she turned instantly, bowing.  
  
"Sensei?"  
  
"I think it's time you learned to better focus your ki." He said, "That is where your fire-starting power comes from, you know."  
  
She shook her head. She did not understand what he was telling her. Besides, her fire-starting, her pyrokenesis, was bad.dangerous! Horrible things happened when she used it! Look what happened when she showed him it that one night.with the candles.and her family had paid the ultimite price! If she'd only kept her power hidden, inside, than those aweful men would never have found her house. Never have hurt her family like that.  
  
"I can't." She said, turning away, "The fire is.not right."  
  
"What do you mean?" He asked, "Look at me when I am speaking to you!"  
  
She started, like a small child at the sound of an elder's reprimanding tone, and turned back to him, afraid to met his ebony eyes. "I don't know how to explain it, Sensei." She started, paused, and went on; "Whenever I use my power.something happens.something bad. Sometimes right away. Sometimes later. I must not ever use it. Ever!"  
  
"Your power isn't bad, Tori." He said, slowly, as if speaking to a very small child, which she was, to him, "It comes from the ki.the energy and essence that is life and all it's power and strength. All of us, all things living, have some amount of ki within, it's just a matter of learning how to tap into it. You must lose these ideas you have that what you can do is wrong and bad. It's not, Tori, here, give me your hand."  
  
She did so, he took her hand and held it palm upward, slowly she felt something akin to heat, only it did not burn. As she watched, a small bit of flame seemed to lick across her palm. He placed his other hand over her's and the flame grew until it was an orb, glowing with something she could not name but the feeling was somewhat like what she felt when she made her fire work for her. A kind of faint tingling, like touching a low voltage electic fence. The current ran over her hands and up her arms, like a million buzzing insects.  
  
"Feel that, Tori?" He asked, not waiting for her to respond, he went on; "Now, try your fire-starting power.only just a little."  
  
She reached into herself for the power she knew always slept at the core of her being, pulled it forth, just a little, as he instructed, and watched in amazement as her tiny flame joined the ball flickering between their hands.  
  
"Make it larger, but pull the heat back." He said, taking his hands away, she was momentary confused. No heat? But how could she.Then she smiled, for suddenly, it all made sense. She pulled a bit more of the power from within, focusing on making the flame dancing upon her palm larger.and the sphere she'd seen and felt between them came into being between her own hands. The flame still flickered within it's center, it's warmth comforting though not scorching. The crackling of sensation flowed thoughout her being.  
  
"Good." Piccolo said, encourging her, "Now, remember this."  
  
She nodded, pulled the whole thing back into herself and smiled. Nothing bad would happen. She knew.  
  
"Tomorrow," He said, looking at her with narrowed eyes, though she could hear a tinge of what sounded like satifaction in his tone, arms folded over his chest, "You learn to fly." 


	14. Shattered Dreams

Tori sat on the floor of the bedroom Chi Chi and Goku had given her, a box lay in front of her, scorched and blistered. She stared at it with narrowed eyes, willing her hands to move towards it, to open it's cracked and peeling lid that used to have a sigil of a lion with wings on the top.  
  
She'd gone back to her old house, if it could even be called that, it was just a pile of smoldering rubble now, and sifted through the remains for anything that she could take with her that had belonged to her loved ones. When she'd seen the box all other material odds and ends, no matter how unscathed were swiftly forgotten.  
  
She touched the metal of the box and let her fingers drift over the once familiar item, memories of happy times with her family came rushing back and her eyes flooded with tears. She'd thought she'd cried all her tears out a long time ago. She had been doing very well with her training and had learned how to use her ki to lift herself from the ground a little bit, not much, but it was progress. She'd thought that she'd left her time of greif behind to focus on something far more tangible.vengence!  
  
Yet, as Tori held the small, damanged metal box in her hands before her and thought about what it held within it's protecting grasp, her heart felt as if something had grabbed it and was ripping it apart. She sobbed and hiccuped, swiping a hand over her eyes to wipe away the water and steeled herself. She knew that she must open it. She knew that she must look inside and face the past and the hurt and anger.only then could she move on.only then could she deal the justice she knew her family wanted her deliver! "Mommy." She flipped the lid back, revealing a stack of photos miraculously hardly touched by the fire, just the edged curled a bit. She plucked out the one on the top of the pile, her mother looking younger than her, bright eyes and rosey cheeked in a light powder blue dress that hardly reached to the top of her knees. A soft smile played on her lips and her hands held a bouquet of pink and dyed lavender silk flowers.  
  
It was one of her mother's wedding pictures. She looked so alive and happy. Her long, flaxen hair straight down her back like a shimmering waterfall, a few tendrils on the sides of her pale face curled into becoming ribbons to frame her heart-shaped features. Features that Tori saw every day that she looked into the mirror, right down to her cornflower blue eyes.  
  
The man standing next to her mother, tall and lean and dark. With eyes that Tori had always fondly called 'honey-almond' due to their shape and their sweetness. Oh, how she missed the way her father would look down at her with such love and pride in his eyes.her chest ached as a droplet fell upon his handsome, smiling face, a face that had turned it's share of female heads in his day and even later, after Tori had grown some and he'd gained the touch of silver at his temples that made him look distinguished.  
  
She lifted the wedding photos out and looked at several snapshots of family vacations, her birthday as a toddler, her face smeared with stawberry icing, since, even at such a tender age, knew what she wanted and she did not like chocolate! She came across pictures of April as a baby and a toddler, how cute she looked in her christianing gown, the same one she had worn and later, Todd.  
  
Tori found the last few photos were random pictures of April and Todd from the last few years. Todd with his buck-toothed smile and love of anything creepy-crawly and just plain gross. She remembered hours on the floor of the livingroom creating great 'cities' out of building blocks and action figures and cars and trucks and toy spaceships with her little brother gazing at her like she was the most wonderful creature that he'd ever laid eyes on.  
  
He loved it when she'd play 'cars and 'trucks' with him and she bit her lip to stifle the pain in her body when she thought about how cruel she was to him over the past few months when she had wanted her freedom and he had just wanted his big sister. She hated herself for feeling annoyed with him when he'd follow her around, he'd wanted to be just like her. He emulated her every move as best he could and bragged about her in school to his buddies. How she missed him! She'd give anything to be able to hear his hyper little voice shout out that he'd found something disgusting in the dirt in the backyard! Anything to gaze, just once, into his huge blue eyes.  
  
She sighed and her eyes fell onto a picture of her sister. April had been wearing a formal gown of dark crimson. Her hair was done up in a cute little bun on the top of her head which was titled ever so slightly in that half-cute, half-rebellious attitude she'd developed from her preschool years on. She was smiling in a kind of half-smirk at the camera and Tori raked her mind to recall just what was happening during the taking of that picture. Ah! She had it. The father-daughter dance when she, April, was twelve. April had been so proud of her new dress that she'd picked out herself and begged their mother to let her wear it before the dance, to school, to show off to all her friends. Of course their mother had more brains than that and refused to allow April to even breath on the dress until it was night of the dance.  
  
She gazed though haze-fogged eyes at the picture of her sister and thought back to the talks she used to have with her, late at night when April got scared of some dream she had and ran across the hallway to crawl into bed with Tori. Tori had spend many nights telling her little sister made-up bedtime stories to frighten her nightmares away and allow the younger girl to sleep better.  
  
She also remembered fits of nearly insane giggles that would wake their mother up until she came into the room and joined them, ending with one of them suggesting cocoa and marshmellows. It had become a random ritual of sorts among the Lawson girls. The menfolk always slept though everything, Tori recalled, smiling past the tears.  
  
"But now, there will be no more late night giggle fests," She mumered half to herself, half to the ghosts of her siblings and parents she somehow felt were always near, "And April will never go to another dance.never show off a new, pretty dress.and Toddy.he'll never get to play cars and trucks again." Suddenly more angry than sad, she picked up the box and threw it as hard as she could at the opposite wall, screaming as she did so.  
  
Just before it hit, she lifted her hand and, as fast as it took her draw breath, the box exploded in a wash of flame, the sound terrifying loud, and rained down scattered bits of still-smoking debris from the ceiling. She turned to the scattered photos on the floor and, knowing that nothing could erase their faces, voices, hands, laughter, selves, from her mind and memory, she pointed downward.  
  
A tickle of flame crawled down her finger and beamed outward towards the photos. She consentrated a bit and the remaing pictures were engulfed in the fire of her power. She watched them burn and curl and become black nothingness before she stomped out the remaining flickering embers.  
  
She cleaned up the room, sat down on the bed and tucked her feet up under herself. She closed her eyes and, for the first time in her life, actually willed a vision to come. She had been giving this a lot of thought over the past few months. She'd never known, why, exactly she'd never thought of it before. Perhaps because her visions were normally so painful, both physically and mentally, and frightened her so much that she never bothered to look beyond merely getting rid of them.  
  
She could use her visions as tool.to aide her. She could find those who killed her family. Find them and them deal with them. Tori sighed and breathed deeply, moving into the alpha state of conscience as easily as if she'd been doing it all her life. She knew, a few more moments, and she would be difting, free.her spirit in the void and her body waiting below.held tethered to her soul by a mere silvery ribbon, visible only to her ghost-eyes. It was within the velvet blackness, other spirits like stars twinking just out of reach all around her, she would find the answers she seeked. She knew.it was here.where everything was old and new at the same time.that she would find where they were.  
  
And there would be no hiding. At all. 


	15. The Dragonballs

Bulma and Chi Chi were talking in the livingroom while Chi Chi folded clothes and Bulma was painting her fingernails a pretty shade of medium blue that matched her hair and eyes. She paused, the nail polish brush held in midair, and said; "I know what you're saying, Chich, and it's a wonderful idea, but the way she'll been feeling about the whole thing, I don't think that will stop her from killing who-ever was resonsible in the first place."  
  
"But, it's the best idea!" Chi Chi exclaimed, "I don't know why none of us thought of it before, after all, we'll all brought loved ones back."  
  
Maybe none of us mentioned it was because we don't like to think about those times, losing someone close to you, even for a moment, is painful, Bulma thought, and felt like a complete selfish moron for not telling Tori about the dragonballs in the first place! What the hell was in her head? Rocks? She screwed the brush-lid back into the nail polish bottle and placed it on the coffee table along with her other make-up and hair styling products.  
  
"I'm going to tell her about them right now!" She annouced, leaving the room to go find Tori.  
  
As it was; the girl was outside, with Piccolo, training. As she'd been doing every day for awhile now. She was getting stronger and using her ki to control her fire-powers had become easier and easier the more she practiced. The area she had the most trouble in was flying. She'd been working on that for a bit, only being able to lift herself a few inches off the ground before she'll begin to lose control and fall, once more, back to earth.  
  
She'd get it, Piccolo was certain, eventually. He saw movement from the corner of his eye and the flash of blue told him Bulma was approuching. She called out to Tori, interrupting her just as she was forming a ki ball. Letting it fade out along her palm, she spun around, her golden hair held back in a tight braid down her back, shimmering in the afternoon sunlight.  
  
"Bulma." She greeted without smiling. Tori rarely smiled these days. The fact cut Bulma like a knife. She could have put have put a stop to this, a long time ago, and felt guilty. She wouldn't blame the girl for hating her after what she told her. "Tori, I have something to tell you." Bulma said and Tori did not miss the look of shame which flashed across her friend's face, "Can we go someplace.to.to talk?"  
  
Piccolo watched them depart. He knew what Bulma was about to tell her and fought with his own self over it. He'd known about the dragonballs and what they could do. Why, then, had he kept his mouth shut on the subject? Why didn't he just tell her, right away, that they could bring her family back? Was it because, then, she'd have no reason to be his student? She'd have no reason to spend any time at all with him?  
  
He blanched a lighter shade of green as he realized what he'd done and the reason he'd done it, however unintentonally. He'd not mentioned the dragonballs to her because he had begun to enjoy their time together.he'd began to having feelings for the girl. He growled deep in his throat and called himself ten times the fool. How would he ever explain himself to her?  
  
"Bulma?" Tori asked, brushing dirt from her staind gi, "Just what, exactly, are you saying?"  
  
"I'm saying that there are these magical balls, called dragonballs," Bulma said, not meeting Tori's light blue stare, "And that if you can find all seven, a dragon will apear and grant you any wish you desire."  
  
"All I want is to avenge my family's death." Tori folded her arms across her chest and in a gesture she'd picked up from Piccolo, her face falling into a semblence of one of his expressions as well, "That is all."  
  
Bulma shook her head, ignoring Tori's rage-filled glare, "You don't understand, Tori!" She cried, taking hold of the younger woman's shoulders and shaking her gently, "We can use the dragonballs to wish your family back! They can be alive and with you again!"  
  
Tori was taken aback, her whole world seemed to fall apart as the meaning of Bulma's words sunk in. Her family.alive again? No! It's not possible! She shook her head, shoving away from Bulma, who yelped in surprise.  
  
"I never thought of you as cruel, Bulma." She said slowly, shivering, her back to the blue-haired woman, "But this is the meanest thing anyone's ever said to me. How can you tease me like this?"  
  
"Tease you?" Bulma asked, "Tease you? Tori, I would never.I'm serious! They really do work that way! As long as whoever you are wishing for to come back hasn't already been brought back once before."  
  
Tori turned around, the disbelief in her eyes clear for Bulma to read, "You.you're not kidding, are you?" She asked, "Your telling me the truth."  
  
"Of course I am!" Bulma sighed, "I.I'm your friend, Tori." Sudden anger flashed across Tori's normally angelic-looking face; "If you're my friend, as you say, Bulma, then why didn't you say anything about these so-called 'magical balls' earlier?"  
  
Tori's words felt like a blade ripping into her heart. She shook her head, unable to answer. She felt the tears behind her eyes and said, her voice ragged; "I'm sorry, Tori. I.don't know why I never mentioned them. Please, please forgive me.!"  
  
Sighing, Tori took the other woman in her arms and held her, telling her without words that she was forgiven. After all, Tori thought, I need all the friends I can get. She did not know why Bulma had not told her, but she thought if anyone would have told her something so vital it would have been Piccolo, and yet, he'd kept as silent as Bulma. Why?  
  
She wondered if there really were such things.  
  
"We'll all start looking for them right away!" Bulma said, "I have my dragon radar someplace around here."  
  
Tori wasn't listening, she turned and saw Piccolo floating in the air behind them, watching them, watching her. She did not understand the look in his eyes and something deep in her gut moved, like butterflies on the wing and she had to look away. 


	16. Confessions

They had been training for only a few hours, Tori was attacking with full force and the anger flashing in her eyes could almost be felt. She narrowed her eyes and came at him again. Piccolo defended himself easily enough. She was still very young and had much to learn, but he did not like that look in her eyes.especially not when it was directed at him!  
  
"Tori." He said, as she stood panting before him, her hair mussed and her gi ripped, her blue eyes shooting sparks, nearly literally! "Take a break. Calm yourself."  
  
She glared at him for a moment, turned and strode away.  
  
Damn. He cursed to himself. He knew exactly why she was so upset and could he really, in all honesty, blame her? No, he shook his head, his cape fluttering behind him in the slight breeze, I can't blame her at all. But I can get her to forgive me. At least I can try.  
  
One of the things Tori had trouble with was facing her own feelings, oh, anger and rage felt good.at times.were easy to have and to show. She didn't feel shamed or embarraced those feelings. It was those other feelings which she did not understand how to handle and so she'd done the only thing she knew how, fell back on anger and than ran away!  
  
He knows why I'd be so angry.She said to herself as she picked grass off her gi, But he doesn't know that I forgave him already.why did I have to act like I hated him? She had thought she hated him, for a while after what Bulma had told her about the dragonballs sunk in. But, she knew that wasn't true. She could never hate him. Something hard and hurtful filled her chest, making it difficult to breath as her stomach made those little fluttery motions she'd become a bit familiar with.  
  
She still couldn't believe that she was going to get her family back. If what Bulma told her was true. She still had a hard time taking in and understanding that a few balls would be able to bring her family back from the dead.  
  
"It's not the balls, Tori," Bulma had told her, "It's the dragon who will grant the wish."  
  
A dragon, eh? She looked around and had to seriously ask herself if it were she who were insane or they? She sighed deeply. No matter. If Bulma wanted to try this dragonballs things she was more than welcome to. Besides, Tori thought, for all she knew, it might just work. For all she knew.  
  
She's not gone far, he could still feel her very close by, a jumble of mixed feelings; anger, confusion, disbelief, a tiny bit of.yes, joy. He followed his senses until he found her, standing behind the training building he and Vegeta often frequented. She had had back to him and her hair was coming out of it's braid. It shone like spun gold in the light of the afternoon sun.  
  
Piccolo had a very real urge to reach out and touch that hair, to find out, once and for all if it really did feel as soft as it looked. He must have made some sound for she spun around, inches from him and looked up into his face. She did not fully understand what she saw there and it frightened her. She took a step backwards, the wall of the building behind her.  
  
"Tori." He began, "I.am sorry for.for not telling you about the dragonballs."  
  
She did not speak, her heart had become a hummingbird whose wings beat double-time within her chest, she waited as he continued, a bit slow and awkward, sounding how she felt.  
  
"I was just.afraid that if you knew." He said, looking away, looking nervous, "That you'd have no more reason to stick around and I." He turned back to her, looking down into her face, in her eyes. They looked like the sky, Piccolo mused, so beautiful. "I come to care for you.very much and."  
  
She shook her head, smiling, laughter broke through her lips; Not at him. Never at him. She was laughing at her own stupid foolishness. She reached up, cupped his face between her hands and said; "You were all ready forgiven. Now kiss me."  
  
"What?" He asked, taken aback, he was not expecting this! He was delighted, to be sure, but he'd never really expected her to share his feelings. She sighed and looked up at him with a bit of annoyance in her eyes.  
  
"I said 'kiss me'" She whispered, "Please! Do it before I die!"  
  
He needed no further coaxing. Wrapping his arms about her, he pulled her close and captured her mouth with his own, hungrily, greedily, and played with the tip of her braid, musing, her hair did feel as soft as he'd imagined it would.almost as soft as her mouth beneath his own.  
  
When they finally broke the kiss, she said; "You don't know how long I've been wanting to do that."  
  
He just smiled, "I too."  
  
And he kissed her again. So hard that the breath was knocked from her lungs and she had trouble standing afterwards so that he had to hold her upright. She snaked her around aroud his waist and pulled his head down to meet her's. Well this had certainly turned into the most interesting training session, she thought.  
  
Chi Chi was outside feeding the fish in the pond, she held a glass bowl filled with the fish food that she was dipping her fingers in and sprinking into the water. She walked around the pond and chanced to look up towards the training building. She made a small gasping sound and the glass bowl slipped from her fingers.  
  
Tori and Piccolo moved away from each other as they heard the glass shattering. She looked back towards the sound, towards the house and saw Chi Chi standing there with a very shocked expression on her face, the remains of a glass dish in pieces on the stone walkway by her feet.  
  
Tori looked at Piccolo. "I think she saw us"  
  
He nodded.  
  
"What do we do?"  
  
He shrugged.  
  
She really hated that he wasn't more communitive. Oh, well. She sighed. Might as well face the music.  
  
"We have some explaining to do." She said, at which he merely sighed in annoyance and nodded, following her to where Chi Chi stood gaping. 


	17. More Than Kisses

"Oh. My. God." Chi Chi said, standing there looking at the two beings who stood, somewhat nervously, in front of her. The girl; Tori, looked as if she'd just gotten caught with her hand in the cookie jar. And what a cookie jar it was! "Did I just see what I think I saw?"  
  
"Sorta, Chich." Tori said, blushing furiously, she felt rather than saw Piccolo starting to back away, eager for an escape. Damn him! She cursed silently, he's not gonna take off and leave me to deal with this alone! She reached back and took hold of his cape, ceasing is stuble movement. No one, not even Piccolo, liked to be around Chi Chi when she began upset by something. "I don't know know what to say, though, It just...sorta happened."  
  
"This is correct." Piccolo spoke up for the first time since they'd stepped over to the stunned woman gaping at them, "And I don't see why we should have to explain ourselves to you."  
  
He winced, waiting for her shrill outburst. None came. She merely shook her and and bent to begin picking up the pieces of broken glass. At last she raised her dark eyes to Tori's light ones. She smiled in that motherly way she had; "Of course not." She said, a peculiar twinkle in her eyes, "I was just.surprised. Forget about me."  
  
"Hey! You guys!" Tori turned to Bulma, a wide smile on her face, wearing what looked to be one of Vegeta's shirts and no pants, ran out of the house. The chill in the air didn't seem to bother her. She ran over to Tori and waved a strange looking device in her face. Tori tried to see it but Bulma's hand was shaking too fast in her excitement. It looked like some type of compact. "Look at this! I've all ready located two of the dragonballs! See those blips.right there." She pointed, holding the thing up to Tori's nose, "And here! Come on! The first one's not that far from here!"  
  
Impusively she hugged Tori and said; "Soon, Tori, you'll have a family again! Won't it be nice to sleep in your own bed again and have your own home back?"  
  
Tori nodded, but her eyes stayed to Piccolo where he stood behind them, seeing the pain that passed quickly over his face before he banished it with a stern look, folding his arms across his chest and looking away as if what she did held no interest to him at all. Tori closed her eyes, she could smell Bulma's purfume and it was too strong. Shoving the girl away gently, she said; "Yes, I can't wait."  
  
Laughing, Bulma and Chi Chi left to start packing for the trip. Bulma had said the nearest dragonball wasn't that far away, but what she really meant was that it was three states away.  
  
Piccolo did not move, but his mind was racing. She's going to leave, he thought to himself, as the wind blew his cape around, She's going to get her family and home back and have no more reason to stay here.  
  
He growled in his throat, hating the conflicting emotions rising up within himself, Who care? She's just a little girl. Who cares what she does. But he remembered her mouth under his, the feeling of her lithe body pressed up against his chest, soft, warm.she had tasted so good. Stop this! He yelled at himself, unable to cease the strange sensation in his chest, it felt as if something there were breaking apart, She just said that she wanted to leave. She'll be better off, in the long run, with her family.  
  
"Piccolo.Sensei?" Tori reached out, she touched his arm.  
  
He jerked away and said to her, a snarl in his voice; "I am not your teacher anymore, girl!"  
  
She felt stung more by his actions than by his words, why had he moved away from her touch as if she'd burned him. She had not used her power, she knew, she could feel it circling around in her gut, as always, but she had not called it forth. She looked at his broad back, wanting so badly to go and wrap her arms around him.  
  
At last he broke the silence; "I can't be anymore, Tori." His voice was soft, gentle, all the spleen gone now, he turned to face her and for the first time she saw the raw agony in his eyes, "Don't you see, girl? It can never be how it was.before."  
  
Before they'd kissed, Tori knew and sighed. She appoached him and looked up into his face, a face, over the past few months, she had come to love. She reached up and ran the back of her hand tender across his cheek. "I don't think I want it to go back to the way it was." She whispered, as she felt his arms snake up around her from behind, pulling her nearer, her lips inches from his she added; "And I think.neither do you."  
  
He had wanted to taste her mouth again, to see if it really was a sweet as he'd remembered, and now that his chance was there he'd be damned if he wasn't going to take it. She shivered against him as his hands moved up and down her back, her tongue darted and played with his, she pressed her mouth closer and brazenly deepened the embrace.  
  
She wasn't certain, exactly, how they'd gotten to the secluded spot deep in the trees surrounding the property, but she didn't much care. There was only one thing she cared about, one thing that filled her senses and left her reeling with emotion, so much so that the fire-magic in her gut threatened to pour out of her in all directions.  
  
Piccolo was holding her, that was all that she cared about. All that mattered. The world could come crashing down around their ears and she would not hear or see or feel any of it. He'd removed his cape and turban with the weights and she was slightly surprised to see them just dispear. She shrugged mentally and pulled him down to the soft forest loam with her, her eyes blazing a kind of fire mere water could not put out.  
  
She pulled gently on one of his annatae, caressing it with her fingers and felt him shudder against her, his breathing becoming ragged. She was sitting between his legs, his hands moving swiftly to undo the plait of her hair. He had wanted to feel it flowing like gold through his fingers, and she sighed as his fingers touched the back of her neck, the sensitive spot that gave her goose-flesh all up and down her arms.  
  
"Tori." He said, at last pulling her braid apart so that golden waves of hair fell across er narrow shoulders and down her back like a waterfall, "You must know.Nameks don't have.have what human males do."  
  
She looked him in confusion.he went on, seeing he would have to educate her. And he'd been loving the feel of her hands on his sensitive annatae.he sighed; "I cannot.pleasure you like a human male."  
  
Her eyes darted to his crotch, her cheeks flashing, and as at last she registered what he was trying to say. She shook her head. It didn't matter. She said to him; "It don't matter, Piccolo. There are other ways.I just want you so bad, I want to feel your skin against mine, your mouth on mine.I don't care how."  
  
Her words, spoken softly against his ear as she flicked her tongue out to glide across and kiss the tip gently, moved something deep and primal inside of him. He leaned down and brought his lips to her throat, then, wondering what her flesh would be like, licked a tiny spot and caused her to shake suddenly in his arms.  
  
Tori had never been with anyone.human or other. She reacted by instinct alone now, as her hands grasped the front of his dark purple gi and pulled him closer, she felt as if she would never be able to get close enough to him and the feeling was driving her mad. He slipped his across the material of gi, feeling the roundness of her breast beneath, the nipple beginning to peak from his touch. Without pausing to ask it would be all right, he took ahold of the material with both hands and ripped it apart. The pure savagery of the act aroused her in ways she could not explain and whimpered as she felt Piccolo's mouth around one of nipples.  
  
Tossing her head backwards she cried out as he sucked, gently, teasing her flesh and grasped him by the back of his head, urging him upwards, she sought his mouth almost desperately with her own. "Your so soft." His spoke against her mouth, voice deep and rumbling, and filled with awe, "I never knew women could be so soft."  
  
"You'd better not be thinking about any other women!" She said, sounding a lot like Bulma right then. He winced as her shrillness stung his ears, but merely smiled and told her to shut up before he kissed her again.  
  
He removed her clothing, bit by bit, tearing it off of her so that the remaining rags hanging on could be easily removed. He wanted to see her, all of her, with no material blocking his vision. She made a small sound in her throat as he left her arms for a moment to gaze down at her. She was so.small.and lovely.  
  
And how he wanted her. Wanted to feel her, every part of her. He wanted to explore her flesh over and over with hands, mouth, eyes.  
  
"What are you doing?" She asked, opening her eyes to see him looking down at her with a look in his eyes that was very similair to the one Goku always got when dinner time rolled around, "Piccolo?"  
  
"Shhh, girl." He said, "You're ruining the moment."  
  
"Nothing can do that." She said, and reached for him, she did not mind the cold as long as he was there to keep her warm, "Nothing."  
  
Tori wasn't certain how long, exactly, she'd slept. But she awoke wrapped in his arms, something covered them both and she was surprised to see it was his cape, he had summoned it back, she thought, shrugging, cuddling closer.  
  
Piccolo had not slept. Though, the girl, Tori, probably thought he had. He 'dcontinued to hold her close, feeling her naked body pressed up against his own and nearly sighed with the pleasure such a feeling caused. Eariler, he'd drapped his cape about them both and listened to her heart beating against his own as she difted off to sleep.  
  
Now she was stirring, though she didn't really wish to leave his embrace. She felt cold, though and being without clothing did not help matters. She closed her eyes, concentrated, and formed a sorta bubble of warmth all around them, keeping the chill at the edges so that it did not affect them. Piccolo looked at and smiled; "Neat trick."  
  
"You were right." She said, as she sat up, his cape drapped about her shoulders, falling down but not quite hiding her nudity, "About my ki. I can control my powers better, now."  
  
He nodded, also sitting up, "And use it in ways you never thought possible.before." He said; indicting her heat-sheild.  
  
Tori smiled, but something, something as sutble as a moth's wings, flickered at the back of her mind. 


	18. Hydrokenetic

A/N: Thanks and credit goes to my dear friend Demoness Yasha for her suggestion of the hydrokenetic villian. Awesome, girl! Hope you like it!  
  
~Ami  
  
She looked down and saw a bit of water seeping beneath her invisiable barrier and instictivly moved away from it. She did not know why, exactly, but that small trickle made her blood run cold and she knew, without saying how she knew, that is was.wrong.evil.  
  
"P-Piccolo.?" She reached for him, "We have to get away from.."  
  
Before she could finish her sentence that small bit of liquid spun about and began moving in the opposite direction, reminding Tori of a snake turning in it's course and suddenly, a voice filled the air behind them.  
  
"My my my." It sang, "What have I found? I go out hunting alone and look at what I've found!"  
  
Tori turned to see a stranger standing there. He, for it was indeed male, had hair that was long, nearly past his shoulders, that seemed the hue water, silvery-blue and shimmering. His eyes, as he looked down at her, not hiding the fact that what he found most interesting about her were her.ah.assets.were ice blue and looked just as cold. A bit of water trickled from his fingers as he grinned down at them.  
  
"This should be fun." He said, looking at the huge namek who had all ready gained his feet. He'd shoved the girl behind him. Too bad, he thought, I was enjoying looking at her.  
  
Without waiting a moment more than nessesary, the stranger seemed to glow and shimmer, and suddenly, without warning, a tidel wave of water came crashing out of him straight towards Piccolo. Tori screamed as he was thrown back, as much by the force of the attack as by surprise as to exactly what type of attack it was.  
  
Tori got to her feet, not even caring anymore than she wore nothing by what God had graced her with upon her birth, and faced the boy, who was only a little older than herself; "So that's what this is, huh?" She asked, her blue eyes narrowing, taking a fighting stance, "Your game's water, eh? We'll two can play at this!"  
  
She held her hands out, fingers splayed and called up her own power, feeling the air around them become charged. She watched in satified pride as the blast exploded from her hands in fiery brightness, heading towards the boy. He flew backwards, into a tree, and Tori saw him raise his arms up and call upon his own power to shield the flames from searing his flesh and burning his clothes.  
  
"No one." He growled, coming after her, "Attacks me and lives to tell about it! Certainly not some stupid bitch!"  
  
Tori barely heard him, she felt an odd tingle and looked down at herself for a fraction of a second, realizing she wore what seemed to her old gi, only it wasn't stained or torn.She had no time to question it as the boy was now tossing balls of water at her that would explode with the force of a storm when they made contact with her flesh. She felt the first few and darted like a cat out the reach of the others. Somewhere behind her she felt Piccolo, but she could not spare him a glance to see what he was doing. He should be helping kill this guy, that's what he should be doing! With the two of them they should be able to put an end to his antics..  
  
"Missing your lover?" The boy mocked, laughing, "I decided that this battle should be just between the two of us. It's pretty poetic, once you think about it, isn't it? Two elemental-power users, locked in battle.?"  
  
He lauged again and Tori used that as a distraction to glace over at Piccolo. She gasped at what she saw. He was held, suspended in place, by a cell of pure water! The bars were moving liqiud and steam was rising off them, over his head as well as round him, close, but not close enough to scald, unless he tried to go through them to escape. "Piccolo.no!"  
  
"Don't think about me, girl!" He called to her, sweat beading his face from the closeness of the heated water, "Just fight!"  
  
"You see," The boy said, tossing his hair back in a very feminine gesture, Tori thought, "I too can use heat to my advantage. If he tries to escape, I will only make to hotter."  
  
"Who are you?" Tori cried, not understanding this at all, "Where did you come from and why are you doing this?"  
  
"Full of questions are we?" He asked, pretending to look thoughtful and pained; "Well, you see, when I was a little boy I didn't get enough love and attention from my mother so." He paused, looked at her and at the impisioned Piccolo and laughed, "Ah, who the hell am I kidding, I came to this planet because I wanted to try out my new powers and I'm attacking you because I can!"  
  
Tori did not answer, she blocked his attacks as best she could and called upon her pyrokenesis to aid her. She wasn't about to let this water- controlling asshole win! She'd roll over and die first! She thougth as she avoided another blast of those scalding, exloding water bubbles he was so fond of.  
  
"You will never beat me, girl." He said, coming close to her, his face and body were nearly as bruised and cut as her own, "Might as well give up now."  
  
"Over my dead.body!" She screamed and threw more flames at him, with he ducked and they caught fire to a nearby tree, quickly spreading through the branches and towards it's fellow trees surrounding them. Piccolo's eyes wided at the sight of the flames, if they didn't stop it, the fire would travel until it surrounded the whole area! Everything would burn to nothingness and Tori and the strange, demented kid were too involved in their fight with each other to realize it!  
  
"Tori! No!" He yelled, watching those greedy, hungry yellow tongues of flame; "The fire!" "Yes! Let it burn!" The boy laughed, and laughed, Tori wanted to rip his tongue right out of his mouth, slit his throat with her fingernails and silence his laughter once and for all; "How does it feel, Tori, to use your powers for destruction? Pretty good, huh?"  
  
"N-no!" She cried, seeing he flames but knowing she was all ready too late, "What have I done.?"  
  
"Fun, huh?" He went on, "Just think, in less than no time at all everyone and everything here will be ashes and smoldering cinder! Unless they manage to escape. Your friends in the house, I believe they'll be able to outrace the fire." He looked at Piccolo; "But your lover here, hmmm, I don't know if he'll be as lucky."  
  
"You bastard!" Tori cried, understanding; "You made me do that! You made me use my own powers against myself and my friends!"  
  
"Perceptive, aren't we?" He said, studying his fingernails, He looked up at her, his eyes blazing; "Come with me, Tori. I've changed my mind about killing you. Come with me and we can be a power no one be able to withstand!"  
  
"Tori!" Piccolo cried, "The flames.!"  
  
"Join me, Tori." The stranger spoke, and indicted the flames, "And I'll put out the fire. You know I can do it. Your friend's lives are in your hands, Tori. Just one word from you and the fire will be out." 


	19. Unlikely Siblings

A/N: Much thanks and credit goes to Demoness Yasha for her ideas and description for the character "Terra" and for Cyclone's name. Hope you like it! Thanks again!  
  
~Ami  
  
Tori stood as if tranfixed, watching the flames grow higher, more hungry as they lapped up everything it their path with angry tongues. Her heart pounded beneath her breast and she heard the mocking laughter of the man in front of her.  
  
Cyclone, she'd read his name from his mind, a talent she'd been getting better and better at the more she learned about controlling her ki. It seemed that telepathy went hand in hand with her pryokeneisis and sometimes she could pick up a being's thought and emotions if they were particularily strong.  
  
"Come on girl." Cyclone laughed, swirling water in small cones on the palms of his upturned hands playfully, "I haven't got all day you know."  
  
"Cyclone!" Tori turned at the sound of the voice, a voice that she'd never heard before, and gaped at the sight of the being standing behind the powerful madman. She hadn't been there a moment ago.how? But the woman was speaking again, holding a knarled staff with ivy wrapped about it and an orb glowing green atop, it was nearly as tall as she; "I've been looking all over for you! What are you doing here?"  
  
"As if I'd share my plans with you, sister." Cylone said, not looking at the beautiful woman with the dark, nearly black, lusterious forest green hair which reached her knees and swished in the breeze caused by the flames, a ring of ivy sat becomingly as a crown upon her head, "Why don't you just go back to the ship and wait for me there."  
  
"That won't do." She said, glancing at Tori and Piccolo, "That won't do at all."  
  
She raised her staff and Tori actually saw the energy traveling from her arm to the olive-complexioned hand which grasped it towards the orb resting at it's end. "Time to stop this madness." She pointed the staff's sphere, which Tori saw had begun to pulsate and glow with an inner light, towards the ground near the first trees that had caught the flames.  
  
As Piccolo and she watched, the earth began to gurgle and bubble, a line of dirt formed, racing for the trees and rose up along the trees' trunks, towards the flames. There came a hissing noise and the flames began to dye, smothered by the earth with had been rising, uncommon, from the ground to assualt them in their depths of rapture. Tori gasped but breathed a sigh of relief.  
  
"What are you doing?!" Cyclone cried, his blue hair flying in the face of his anger, "Terra! No! You don't understand! With this girl we can be the most powerful..."  
  
"Shut up!" The woman, Terra, spat, "Little brother. You've gotten into trouble for the last time!"  
  
"Your wrong, sis!" He screamed, "I haven't even begun!"  
  
Cyclone began to gather his power to him. Tori knew the feeling, and felt her own gut churn in response. She looked at the strange woman who'd come to their rescue so sudddenly and then back towards her brother, who was raising his arms and getting reading to launch a blast at his sibling.  
  
"No!" Tori cried just as the water orbs began to form on his hands, without thinking, she screamed as she threw herself into her own power, slamming her flames against him at the same time as the woman pointed downward with her staff and the ground began to shake. It shuddered and cracked beneath her contol, knocking Cylone off balance. Unable to raise his water shields in time, he shreiked in pain as Tori's flames bit into his delicate nearly translucent skin at the same time Terra's crack in the grew deeper and farther apart.  
  
Something flashed across Terra's eyes as she saw her brother hanging onto the ledge of her canyon with both hands, the fingers bloody from hanging on so tightly. He looked up at his sister and tears filled his eyes. "Terra.sister!" He cried, "Please! Help me! I'm begging you! Please!"  
  
Tori got ready to burn him off the edge and end his pleas once and for all, but hand on her shoulder stopped her. She turned, Piccolo! He was out of his cage! She looked. No, it was gone. As if it had never exsisted! She resisted the urge to hug him in her relief and turned back to the two siblings. "Let her handle it, Tori."  
  
"Please!" Cylone begged, "I don't want to die.!"  
  
"But you had no qualms about killing eveyone else." She replied, making no move to save him, "Is that it?"  
  
"I was doing this for us, Terra!" Cyclone cried between fear-addled sobs, "You don't understand! I was doing this for us!"  
  
Sighing, Terra pointed with her staff and the earth beneath her brother began to rise, finally, it pushed him up and the crater closed over it's self. Shaken, but alive, Cylone looked up at the woman, tears streaking his face as he held out his hand to her.  
  
She took it and squeezed gently. For all that he was power-hungry and mad at times, he was still her family.the only family she had and she could not stop loving him. She looked towards the sky and he nodded.  
  
Before he went, though, he cast a look towards Tori that was a mixture of disapointment and yearning. "We could have been big, girl." He said to her, ignoring everyone else, even those who had gathered, summoned by the sounds of the battle, near; "We could have owned.everything."  
  
"I'm happy as I am." She said, and watched as he began to fade from sight, shimmer and finally disapear. His sister turned towards her and Piccolo and the others. She raised her ivy-bound arms and spoke, the skirt she wore was a dark a green as her hair and her green-tinted lips curved into a soft smile; "I am truly sorry for all this. I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive this.My little brother, Cyclone, he means wells, I'm sure of it. He wants me to be happy and he thinks the only way to be happy is to have power."  
  
"That's not happiness." Piccolo said; "Power alone never fills you."  
  
Terra nodded, "He has never learned to love." She said sadly, "I have been trying to help him for years.ever since our parents."  
  
Sensing a need in her that echoed her own, Tori appouched her and placed a hand upon her shoulder, "I lost my family too, Terra." She said, "But I am going to get them back soon."  
  
Terra nodded, the sadness leaving her green eyes as she felt the girl's hand upon her shoulder, touching bare skin. She could feel the power in the touch and shivered in spite of herself. "You would have been a match for him, my dear."  
  
"I nearly joined him!" Tori cried, ashamed, "I nearly gave in!"  
  
"You had no choice." Terra said, "It seemed the only way to save everyone, at the moment."  
  
"Thank you so much." Tori said, and just then Bulma stepped up, looked at the new arrival and asked; "Who are you? What's going on here? What was all that noise?"  
  
"Slow down!" Tori said, "She can't answer you if you don't shut up long enough to listen!"  
  
"I'm famished!" Terra said, instead of answering any of Bulma's queries, "Can we not find something to eat.I'm always so hungry after using my powers."  
  
"Of course!" Goku said, "Come on up to the house and we'll find something to eat."  
  
Tori and Piccolo followed the others, she unable to keep her eyes off the tall beautiful creature who had come, out of the blue, to save the day. Her own mind echoed the questions Bulma had recently voiced. She too, wondered exactly what she was and where she'd come from. 


	20. Cyclone and Terra

Though she had been too distraught over the past few weeks to even think about going back to school, Chi Chi frowned at her and insisted that she miss no more days, now that she was well enough to start going again. Tori had sighed and opened her mouth to argue, but in the end had given in to the motherly figure.  
  
Chi Chi had even taken her shopping for new clothes and books and other school supplies since all of what she'd owned had burned in the fire. Chi Chi had seemed to enjoy the shopping more than she did.  
  
"I've always wanted a daughter." She said, when Tori asked her why she was so gung-ho about buying school clothes for her, "Now, this skirt would look just lovely on you, dear."  
  
She hadn't wanted to go back to school. She wanted to go find the dragonballs with Bulma and the rest. Now it seemed she wasn't even going to get to that much.  
  
"Don't worry, Tori." Bulma had assurred her, typing away on her laptop, "We'll fetch the nearest dragonball and be back before you know it!"  
  
She had wanted to come along, but instead found herself seated at a desk listening to some middle-aged woman drone on about the industrual revelution. Something she, Tori, had absolutly no interest in. All she could think about were what was happening back at the house and of that strange woman; Terra and of Piccolo and the dragonballs which would bring her family back to her.  
  
"Miss Lawson?" She was startled out of her reverie by the teacher's voice, sharp and loud, cutting into her head, "Are you daydreaming again?"  
  
"No!" She cried, and her cheeks flushed at the giggles all around her, "Of course not, Mrs. Beesom! I was.uuhh."  
  
"Hmm." Mrs. Beesom said, tapping her wooden ruler on the side of Tori's desk, "Then you will have no problem answering my question, now will you, Miss Lawson?"  
  
"Ummm.well, what was it?" She laid her head down on her desk as laughter erupted from the other students and the teacher merely sighed, walked back to the blackboard and muttered; "I thought so."  
  
She couldn't wait for the last bell to ring! And to think she had to go back every day save for weekends and holidays for the rest of the year! She hadn't even made any friends yet, since she was still technically a new student. She was nearly the first one out the door after the bell rung and, with her knapsack over her shoulder and cell phone in her pocket, she'd trudged the way back to Bulma's.  
  
She knew the house would be nearly empty. Bulma and Chi Chi, along with Marron, Goku, Krillen and little Gohan, had all gone in search of the nearest dragonball and they said they'd probably be returning within a week or two, depending on what they ran into. The stranger who'd come to their aid not too long ago, had been asked by Chi Chi to stay for a few days and she had accepted the invitation.  
  
".So, I use the orb upon my staff to focus and direct my power." Tori heard the voice as she slammed the door behind her, throwing her back on a chair and saw Terra holding her staff up and Piccolo nodding at her, seemingly interested in what she was saying, they both turned as Tori walked in.  
  
"Tori!" She cried, rushing over to her, "I was just explaining the use of my staff and orb to your friend here. He listens quite well."  
  
Tori nodded and smiled at Piccolo. Vegeta walked in just then, shirtless and wearing a pair of stripped blue and white pajama bottoms, which he looked cute in, of course and snorted in Terra's general direction; "So, this is the great Terra who saved the day a few days ago?"  
  
Terra bowed towards Vegeta and smiled on her way back up, "This is correct. May I assume you are the much revered Vegeta, Prince of Saiyans?"  
  
Tori saw something more pass over her face as she address Vegeta but which the green-locked beauty swiftly hid beneath her soft half-smile, something akin to anger. But it was gone as soon as Tori noticed it so she wasn't sure if it had been her imagination or not.  
  
Vegeta raised his eyebrows, but his pride was more so that he did not question where she got her information. Besides, perhaps one of the Earthlings had informed her, as it was, he assumed that people should just know about him all ready.  
  
Terra narrowed her cat-like green eyes at him, Vegeta took note of the golden center of those mesmerizing orbs and had to look away before he was sucked into them. She touched his arm with a cool hand and felt tingles of energry rising from him in much the same manner as she had once felt Tori's power when the girl had laid her hand upon Terra's shoulder.  
  
"You are very strong." She mused, "Do all you people have great power?"  
  
"Hardly." Vegeta smirked, removing her hand from his shoulder, "Where's Bulma? I'm starving."  
  
"She went after the dragonball, Vegeta." Tori said, as Terra handed her the staff so that she could examine it closer, she was in awe of the beautiful glowing green sphere and watched it pulsate at her touch, "There's bacon and eggs in the fridge, just cook them yourself."  
  
"I am The Prince of Saiyans!" Vegeta growled, "I do not cook!"  
  
"Go hungry then." Piccolo said, secretly amused at Vegeta's darkening in color; "It's no concern of ours."  
  
"I should kill you right now, Namek." Vegeta said, "For your insolence.!"  
  
Without waiting for a reply, the Saiyan Prince added; "It's just lucky for you that I'm too hungry to kill anyone right now."  
  
"Are you sure your brother won't come back, Terra?" Tori asked, ignoring Vegeta's words and scowl, but noting his departure from the corner of her eye, "He needs more help than you can give him."  
  
Terra sighed, taking back her staff from Tori and swirling it one-handed, absently. She shoved a lock of her dark green hair from her face and said, "I know. I've sent him to numerous doctors on our world, but.accidents always seem to befall them, eventually."  
  
"Don't tell us," Piccolo said, standing next to Tori, his nearness was a comfort to the young woman, "They all meet with some kind of water related death?"  
  
"Unfortunatly." Terra said, "Though no one's been able to prove they were anything but accidents. So far. Though I fear for the day he is caught causing some sort of accident."  
  
"If he comes looking for Tori again," Piccolo said, his eyes narrowed, his voice low with meaning, "He's the one who will suffer an accident." "I must apologize once more for him." Terra said, "Please don't think too harshly of him. He is sick, that's all. Inside, my brother is good. I know it."  
  
"How did you lose your parents, Terra?" Tori asked, feeling the woman's pain and the uncomfortable silence surrounding her statement about her brother, "What is your planet called? Is it far from Earth?"  
  
Terra sat down on the floor, cross-legged and gathered her skirts and flowing green cape about her narrowed, bare-shoulders. Tori admired the dark brown off-the-shoulder gauzy blouse she wore with the playful laces up the front. Tori and Piccolo sat down with her, ignoring Chi Chi's spotless mauve sofa and loveseat, and waited for the woman to speak.  
  
"There was an invasion." She said, her eyes taking on a far-off look as she played with the sphere upon the end of her oakan staff, "Many people died. We.we were a peaceful race. We were unprepared for the onslaught of the warriors who came to claim our world as their own."  
  
Tori placed her hand upon Terra's, ceasing the mindless twirling of the staff. She saw the unshed tears in Terra's eyes as she told about the ordeal she'd been through. "We tried to fight, most of my people did, but we were outmatched in so many ways. The last thing our parents did, before they were taken as captives and eventaully killed, was to put my brother and I in a pod bound for a nearby world. We were taken in by an elderly couple and lived with them until our powers began to manifest."  
  
"Then what?" Tori asked, her chin resting on her palm as she listened, intently, to Terra's story.  
  
"Then, Cyclone started getting into trouble at our school," Terra went on, "And the little earthquakes and dust-devils and other things I thought were so fun and playful as a little girl frightened our gaurdians. They cast us out one day and told us never to return. The woman, however, took pity on us and gave us the family space vehicle, after changing the identification codes so that it looks as if she sold it to us, of course. We've been using it as our home ever since."  
  
"What brings you to Earth?" Tori asked, still wanting to know more about her sudden rescuer, "Or are you just passing by?"  
  
Terra shook her head, "No, Cyclone and I," She said, "Are seeking a place to live. Space travel is fine for awhile, but."  
  
"But a home is what you seek." Piccolo finished for her, recalling that his own planet, Namek, for all that he never lived there, was still a part of him and it's loss was felt deeply, "I understand."  
  
"Yes, we were soppose to only be here for a little while," Terra went on, "For me to scan the area and see if we would be welcome here.then, my brother, he felt Tori's power that seemed to echo our own but in a different manner. Before I could stop him he had transported himself directly to your location."  
  
"I remember." Tori said, recalling those painful blasts of scalding water orbs he'd thrown at her, "That's not something I want to repeat!"  
  
"I fear we shall never be welcome, any place we go." Terra looked sad and made Tori wish to comfort her, "This isn't the first time he's tried to do this. Always, I am having to get him out of one scrap or another.and I grow tired of all."  
  
She stood up, and graceful as a willow bending in the breeze, walked to the windows and looked out upon the still duck pond, a slight drizzle had begun to fall and the droplets, as they streaked down the sliding glass door, reminded her of the tears she had yet to shed. She could not weep. Not ever. She'd always been the strong one. It wasn't only that she was older than Cyclone, but that she had had to be both a sister and a mother to him for so long.  
  
Without warning a wave of vertigo overcame her and she swayed on her feet, encased as they were in sandles which laced up her calves, and caught herself by holding out her hands to the glass, marring the surface with her prints. In a moment the feeling left her and her stomach ceased it's roiling. She did not wish these kind people to worry over her.  
  
Yet, both Tori and Piccolo were on either side of her, their arms around her and leading her away towards the sofa. She looked into Tori's eyes and saw that she could not hide from her anything. "Are you all right, Terra?"  
  
"No, she isn't all right." Tori and Piccolo both gasped as the young blue- haired man appeared before them seemingly from thin-air. Piccolo thought it similar to the techinque he's been known to use.  
  
He ignored the looks of both Piccolo and Tori and approached his sister, who was sitting on the sofa now, her head in her hands, looking down. He took her hand in his and knelt before her, the silvery blue tunic and leggings he wore seemed out of place in the modern little house.  
  
He looked up at Tori, tears swimming in his ice blue eyes, "She's dying." 


	21. The Crystal of Y'Lasha

"Dying?" Tori asked, "What do you mean?"  
  
"It's nothing, Tori." Terra said, waving her hand in a dismissive gesture, "My brother loves dramatics." "Knock it off, sis." Cyclone said, looking as worried as he sounded, and angry as well, he turned to Tori and Piccolo, "Something inside of her is breaking, dissolving. Every time she uses her power she gets a little weaker. Soon.if we can't find her help.soon."  
  
"Oh, hush!" Terra said, coughing, "Stop scaring these good people. You know I don't like to be fussed over. I'll be all right."  
  
"Not if we can't find that crystal, Terra!" He cried out, and Terra sighed, to Tori and Piccolo, who were standing by, silently listening, he added; "Ever since she started getting sick.we've been traveling from world to world in search of a very powerful crystal that is said to have the power of healing and renewal."  
  
"So, a place to live wasn't the only reason for your visit to Earth, then?" Piccolo asked, "How do you know this crytal is here?"  
  
"We don't." Terra said, "But we've looked everywhere, for years. If we can't find it here than."  
  
Her words trailed off, but Cyclone finished them for her, "Than there is no hope."  
  
"Don't say that!" Tori cried, taking Terra's hands in her own, "There is always hope! You won't die, Terra! I promise you!"  
  
"You are a sweetheart." Terra said, "And I was thinking of making you your own staff and sphere.and instructing you how to use it.but."  
  
"You still can!" Tori said, her eyes bright, as a thought passed over them, making them sparkle. She turned to Piccolo, "The dragonballs, Piccolo, they can grant any wish?"  
  
"The dragon can, yes." He answered, he had a feeling he knew what she was up to.  
  
"Than, after we locate them all," She went on, "I want to give my wish to Terra. I want her to live."  
  
"But, Tori.what about your family?" Piccolo asked, shocked, and more than a little proud of her selflessness, "You've greived so much."  
  
"And still do, but they are all ready dead and Terrra isn't." She said, "If I could not save my family at least I can save my new friend."  
  
"So.we.won't even need the crystal." Terra said, "If what you say is true. We can just ask for anything and it will happen? Come true?"  
  
Piccolo nodded and Tori said, "Yes. That is, of course, if that is what you want, Terra.."  
  
Terra was about to speak, but she saw her brother moving off to the side, a look in his eyes she'd seen many times before and heard his mental voice in her head.  
  
** Any wish at all.think of it! Any wish! I could be the most powerful being who ever lived.! **  
  
She sighed and turned away, putting up her mental blocks as she did so. No matter that he loved her and would always worry about her, nothing could really change her brother. It made her terribly sad inside to think that once, as children, they had understood each other so well.  
  
"Terra?" Tori asked, "Are you all right? What is it?"  
  
"Nothing, dear." Terra said, "I was just thinking."  
  
Cyclone touched the lapel of his jacket, which he wore over his shining tunic, and began to shimmer, before he went, he said; "We'll find those dragonballs, sister, and you will live..." He added, in his mind where Terra picked it up clearly enough; ** Among other things.**  
  
"Even if we do find those dragonballs," Terra said, as her brother went back to the ship, "We still need to keep looking for the crystal. It's more than just a really powerful rock. It's sort of a family heirloom. The last living piece of our birthhome, Y'lasha.before it was destroyed."  
  
"Surely there are other pieces floating around." Tori began but Terra shook her head, explaining that after the attack on their world they had used great monsterous machines to blow up ever little bit and piece floating through space.  
  
It was only luck or fate that caused one of the pieces, about as large as a fist, to end up in one of the captive's pockets as they were taken off- planet to be sold as slaves. 


	22. This and That, Bits and Pieces

A/N: Sorry my last chapter was so godforsaken short! :)  
  
~Ami  
  
It had been less than three days since the arrival of Terra and her more than a little strange younger brother, Cyclone, who, for the most part, spent his time in their ship beyond the gravity of Earth, waiting. Every once and while, however, he came down, to visit his sister and make sure she was treated all right, he claimed, but Piccolo had the vague feeling that it was more than that.  
  
"I don't like this." He said, as he and Tori sat out by the fishpond and she watched the fish swim in lazy circles around the artificially heated water. It was a particularly warm day for Novemeber, Tori mused, and the thought of Thanksgiving, one of her family's favorite holidays made her chest ache with longing. She turned to Piccolo and asked what he meant. "This. That woman and her brother. He's up to no good."  
  
"Maybe he's just worried about his sister, Piccolo." She said, sighing and shoving a tendril of her pale hair out of her face, "I would be, if I were him."  
  
"How can you defend him?" He asked, incredilous, "He nearly killed you, or have you forgotten?"  
  
"I haven't forgetten anything." She said, "And I am being careful. I won't fall for the same thing twice." As she said that, her eyes seemed to glow a bright red before switching back to her normal blue color.  
  
Piccolo reached out and wrapped an arm about her shoulders, drawing her backwards to rest against his chest. His cape about them both he said softly against her hair as the evening breeze tossled a few strands upwards to tickle his nose; "No matter what happens, Tori. I will not lose you."  
  
Tori shivered in spite of herself. Was it from the cold wind that seemed to come from nowhere? Or was it because of the feirce possessivness in Piccolo's voice against her ear? She could not have said. Instead she nodded her agreement and continued to allow him to hold her.  
  
Standing by the sliding glass door, the Saiyan Prince smirked, arms folded across his chest as she watched the namek and the girl embrace near Bulma's idiotic little fishpond. Well, he mused, as he thought of his mate and why he hadn't gone along with her and the others.he did not relish the idea of spending two whole weeks alone with the cackling hens and has choosen instead to stay home where, hopefully, everyone would just leave him alone to train in peace, At least someone's getting some. He felt a familiar tugging at his groin and growled deep in his throat as thoughts of Bulma's pretty little ass flitted across his mind.  
  
Get ahold of yourself! Vegeta gritted his teeth and turned away from the window, right into Terra, who was heading past towards the kitchen. Her scent nearly knocked the wind out of him and he pressed back against the sliding glass door so as to allow her ample room to pass.  
  
She smells.familiar.He thought as she passed him, and his heart raced in his chest, And good.  
  
Terra, used to the thoughts and emotions of other beings being low-keyed and difficult to pick up, inless they were unusually strong, like her brother's, paused in her direction as she felt an odd surging of her blood and several images that portrayed things being done by two beings in an act of love or procreation which caused her face to flush a deep crimson.  
  
She turned and looked at Vegeta from the corner of her green, cat-slit eyes, reflecting his customary smirk back at him. Vegeta froze instantly as she continued by. But she caught his last thoughts before she entered the kitchen. She heard! But how could she have heard.?  
  
Cyclone grew weary of this. He had wanted to take Terra with him and go seek out those dragonballs himself, but she had wanted to stay and learn more of the strange Earth creatures.even though some of them were obviously not of this planet. He ground his teeth together and sat at the helm, gazing out across the blackness of space and watching the ball of blue and white and green spinning slowly below him, he'd never been able to refuse his sister anything.  
  
He knew, as long as she wanted to remain her that he would have no choice but to wait and bide his time as well. Sometimes he hated his sister so much he could kill her. He resented the fact that she was older and stronger than he. If he didn't love her so much he would have found a way to dispose of her long ago.  
  
As it was, right at the moment, as he drummed his fingers along the chair's arm, he was more bored than he ever thought possible. At least during those long years in space he had Terra to talk to. Now.now even talking to himself had grown tiresome. He played with balls of floating water for awhile, experiment with new forms of this power, and when, at last, he could come up with no more new shapes or ways in which to apply it, he sighed and sank down deeper into the chair.  
  
Suddenly, as a lark, he switched on the monitor that showed where his sister was at all times and the surrounding area. He sat up straight in the chair and pressed the zoom-in button. Off a ways from the main house, nearly where he'd first encountered the green one and the little blonde woman-child, he saw someone going through the motions of training.  
  
Ah, yes! The Little Prince, He said to himself, as he watched the man shoot a series of ki blasts at nearby trees, blowing them up but leaving no fire to spread like the girl had, he obviously had more control and was strong. Very strong! I've just got an idea how to aleviate my boredom.  
  
"Computer." He spoke to the ship, knowing it's advanced technology would grant him whatever was within it's ability should he merely speak his need aloud; "Transport to the cordinates." He paused, looked around to make sure he didn't forgot to turn someone off or something on and as an afterthought before leaving the ship, added; "Run a complete diagnositics on all systems while I'm out."  
  
Meanwhile.A few states away in a hotel room.  
  
"I can't believe it was that easy, Chi Chi!" Bulma beamed as she held the slightly glowing orb in her hands up near her eyes, she counted three stars on it, "Just think! All we needed to do was bribe that porter and he just gave it to us!"  
  
Indeed. Chi Chi thought as she unpacked her and Gohan's clothes. She began folding them up neating and placing them in the dresser drawers. She was sharing her room with Bulma, Gohan and Marron. Krillin and Goku had the room next door. Gohan had wanted to bunk with his father but Chi Chi, having thought ahead, had brought along all Gohan's schoolbooks and said that if he slept in with his father he'd never get any of his work done and would stay up exchanging battle stories with his father and Krillen instead of sleeping or doing homework.  
  
As it was, she all ready had her little son just miserable as could be hunched over a stack of books with his nose nearly touching them at the little desk the hotel provided. She'd made sure to keep the television off as well so as not to distract him from his work. As soon as they'd arrived, Bulma's radar had gone haywire.  
  
They'd followed it's beeping and chirping towards the front desk as a porter was just about to carry someone's luggage up to the elevator. Bulma had approuched him, wearing a tight blue tank that showed off her assets and matched her eyes and very short short pants Chi Chi was nearly certain were illegal in some countries and stopped the man with a carefully timed inhalation of breath and a toss of her blue hair over one shoulder.  
  
"Care to show me what's in your pocket?" She'd giggled, a perfect imitation of Krillen's girlfriend, who was standing next to Chi Chi and others, watching, "I can make it worth your while."  
  
Gasping, his eyes bulging nearly out of their sockets at Bulma's heaving bosom, the porter stuttered, "H-how much?"  
  
"Oh, say." And she leaned over, whispered in his ear as she trailed a finger casually up his lapel to caress his cheek and his eyes bugged even wider, much to Chi Chi and the other's amazment. She glanced over at Goku and smiled as he seemed to look as confused as to what was happening as his son. Not Krillen, however, the short little man was merely smirking side- long at Marron, who seemed oblvious to her boyfriend's leering.  
  
The porter had given Bulma the dragonball he had and she paid him a nice sum of money for it. But Chi Chi had scolded her on the way to their rooms; "I almost thought you forgot you're a married woman, Bulma!"  
  
"Hey, just because I'm married doesn't mean I've forgotten the art of getting what I want from the opposite sex," Bulma said, as they entered the elevator, "Although, I must say, that was too easy."  
  
"Now, after a few days rest here," Bulma went on, "We can go on looking for the next one!" 


	23. Cyclone's Insanity and Hope Springs Eter...

Vegeta paused in his training, looked back just as the one who called himself Cyclone materialized behind him and laid a sudden high kick at his head. Nearly caught off-guard, Vegeta barely dodged and landed a clean punch to the other's face.  
  
Cyclone took the punch and growled, rushed the saiyan prince and sent forth a series of swift kicks and punches, nearly too fast for the naked eye to follow.  
  
Vegeta blocked them all easily and laughed; "You really have high standards for yourself if you expect to best me!"  
  
"I'll do more than best you, shorty!" Cyclone answered, shoving his sweat drenched pale hair from his eyes. He came at Vegeta again with similair results. At last the mighty prince grew tired of this game and wished to end it. He caught Cyclone's arm by the wrist, stilling the punch which would have laid out an ordinary man, and sneered into his face.  
  
"Time for you to see," He snarled, twisting the arm behind Cyclone's back, "Why it was massively stupid to take on a true saiyan!"  
  
He let the youth go and watched at he stumbled a bit and then turned around, holding his hands out in front of him, smiling devilishly as twin spirals of water grew and spun between his hands. He drew them back and aimed for Vegeta.  
  
"Don't try your little water tricks on me!" Vegeta said, the air sparked around him as he powered up. Cyclone watched, yawning as if he were bored, as Vegeta's eyes changed from black to bright aqua and his hair a feirce golden hue. He seemed to glow from within and floated a few feet off the ground, looking down at Cyclone, "Because it will be the last thing you do."  
  
Cyclone laughed and formed a kind of ki ball out of the water he'd summoned, focusing upwards on Vegeta's altered form. "Parlor tricks are no match for Cyclone!"  
  
"Parlor tricks?!" Vegeta exclaimed, outraged, "And this comes from the man who speaks in the third person?!"  
  
Without warning, Cyclone launched the water-ki-ball at Vegeta, his eyes went wide when Vegeta swiftly formed his own ball of energry and tossed it downwards in the path of the water-ball. The explosion knocked Cyclone off his feet. He was stunned but unhurt. Vegeta let himself back down and strode over to him.  
  
"Pathetic." He began to form another ki ball but then changed his mind. He's not worth the waste of enegry, he thought, Though he did provide me with a good workout, He raised his hand above the motionless young man, ready to bring it down on his throat and end everything. He would have done just that, had he not been startled from his task by a sudden, shrill shreik and the ground moving under his feet. "Stop it! Stop it!" Terra dropped her staff and ran to her brother, cradling his head in her lap. She glared up at Vegeta, "What happened here?!"  
  
Piccolo and Tori came running behind Terra, who had sensed the trouble her brother was getting into before she actually heard anything. They came up short behind Terra and Cyclone. Vegeta shifted back into normal mode and powered down. He looked away, raising his chin a notch before he turned back and smirked down at her and her simpleton brother.  
  
"The little idiot attacked me!" He said, as if he cared what anyone thought, "Can you believe it?! Me! Vegeta, Mighty prince of saiyans! The strongest warrior in the uni."  
  
"Excuse me," Tori raised a hand, as if she were in school waiting to be called on, "But, technically, isn't Goku the strongest warrior in the uni."  
  
"Shut up!" Vegeta sneered and took to the sky, "If I'd wanted to hear about Kakkarot I would have located his freaking fan club!"  
  
Piccolo easily helped carry Cyclone back to the house and Terra tended his wounds with expert care. Piccolo left for a while and Tori was too caught up in trying to understand what would drive someone to so obviously risk his life for nothing! She helped Terra splint his leg and clean the blood from his many cuts and place a cold clothe filled with ice from the freezer in the kitchen upon his swollow and purple eye.  
  
He'd begun to stir as they laid a blanket over him as he rested on the sofa where they'd placed him. Piccolo returned with his materialization into the room. Tori jumped, not yet used to that particular mode of transportation. He held some leaves and roots in his hands which he gave to Terra.  
  
Terra, being a child of the earth, no matter what planet she was on, knew the herbs instantly, though this was the first time she'd actually seen them. The moment she used her powers on this planet, the world had opened up to her like a book and she'd read every chapter. She knew it.knew it like the backs of her hands. She nodded a thanks to Piccolo and retired into the kitchen to get to work.  
  
"What was that?" Tori asked Piccolo as she watched Terra depart, "Piccolo?"  
  
"Some herbs." He answered, "It will take away his pain and make him stronger."  
  
"Oh." She said, "I wonder what could have made him so angry that he attacked Vegeta?"  
  
Piccolo shrugged. He did not have an answer for her. "He's lucky to be alive right now."  
  
"I wonder how the women are coming along," Tori said, changing the topic, "With the capturing of the dragonballs." Just then, as if on cue, the little cell phone in Tori's overnight bag chirped quietly. Tori ran to it, found it and flipped back the cover. "Hello?" She asked breathlessly.  
  
"Tori?" She heard Chi Chi's voice on the other end.that and a lot of static, "Are you sure this her number.maybe I misdialed."  
  
"It's her number, I tell you!" Bulma's muffled voice shouted from the background, "Tori! Are you there?"  
  
"Yes! I'm here! What's wrong!" Piccolo's eye ridge rose a notch at the sound of desperation in Tori's tone. "Chi Chi?"  
  
"Oh, Tori!" Chi Chi cried, "It's really you! We got through!" Aside she said to Bulma, "I had my doubts.aren't these things soppose to cause cancer?!"  
  
"Gimme that!" Bulma yanked her cell phone from Chi Chi's ear, thinking; Geez, keep up with the technology, woman! "Tori, guess what?!"  
  
"Whatwhatwhat all ready?!" Tori cried, her hand gripping the phone a little too hard, her powers beginning to melt the plastic a bit.  
  
"We've found the sixth dragonball!!" Bulma cried, "Can you believe it! The sixth one, all ready! It's un-freaking-believable!"  
  
"All we need are.seven." Tori whisped, "That means."  
  
"Only one more left." Piccolo said, his keen namekian hearing having picked up the other end of the conversation, "Do they have a location on the last dragonball?"  
  
"Is that Piccolo?" Bulma asked, hearing, "Tell him that we do, indeed have a lock on a location.but that it's a few hours drive by car from here. We should have it and be back by next week at the latest. That is, of course, assuming it's as easy to get a hold of as the last ones were. Well, the batteries are dying on thing so I rechage it. Talk to ya later, Toshi!"  
  
Terra came out of the kitchen holding a steaming mug between her fingers. She stopped and looked at Piccolo and Toshi, Toshi was closing up her phone and placing it back into her bag. Terra started to go to her little brother, whose eyes were closed but whose breathing indicated he was awake. Tori stopped her and looked at her.  
  
"Terra," She said, "They've found the second to the last dragonball."  
  
"T-that means."  
  
"You're not.hey wait a minute!" She cried, slapping her forehead, "I have an idea! What if he ask the dragon to find and bring us the crystal of Y'lasha that way she can be healed and they will have found their lost relic!"  
  
Silently Cyclone moved in feigned sleep. The dragonballs, he thought, forcing himself not to smile, though he felt like it, Yes! Soon it will be time.dear sister.soon.! 


	24. Under His Sway

Piccolo stood next to Toshi, a bit to the side as she observed, silently, the still form sprawled out on the sofa covered with a thin blanket. She had her head cocked to the side and her long hair fell over one blue eye as she crossed her arms under her chest and took a deep breath. Terra had felt weak and asked to lie down somewhere so Toshi had shown her the room she'd been staying in since her own house had burned down.  
  
He watched her from the corner of his ebony eyes, uncertain as to what she was planning or even as to what she was thinking. Finally, she asked, in a low voice; "What kind of creature is he, Piccolo?  
  
What kind of being would knowingly flirt with death as though it had no more meaning that a used tissue? I saw the way he looked at Vegeta when he first saw him. I know that he knew he was no match for him. I could see it in his eyes, Piccolo. So, why?"  
  
"I don't know." Piccolo shrugged, "I'm tired of watching you stare at him."  
  
Toshi quirked a thin blonde eyebrow at him, "Is that a hint of jealousy I hear?"  
  
"Your crazy." Piccolo snorted, turning away, raising his two fingers to his forehead, "I'll be meditating if you need me."  
  
But Toshi hadn't missed the hint of a smile in his voice before he shimmered out of sight. She looked back down at Terra's disturbed little brother and shook her head. She really wanted to try and understand him better and actually to help him and his sister.  
  
But so far his behavior had only served to fuel her mistrust and contempt. If his sister hadn't proven her worth and sincerity, she would have used her pyrokenesis on him and ended him as he slept, vulnerable, here before her.  
  
But, she felt that she owed Terra the debt of her life and lives of her friends. She also knew that she could not ignore her nature instinct to help a being in need and reached down to pull the blanket up tighter about his shoulders, feeling his forehead with the back of her hand. He felt cool, that was good. She'd been afraid of fever. But, perhaps Terra's herbs had done the trick.  
  
Suddenly, she felt his hand wrap tight about her wrist and his eyes popped open, catching and holding her own in a vice-like grip as strong as his hand about her wrist. She started and tried to draw back but he only tighted his grip and pulled her closer, forcing her down to her knees upon the floor beside the sofa. She was amazed at his strength so soon after a life-threatening injury! He sat up as he held her down until he was face to face with her and whisper harshly, "You are going to help me, little girl."  
  
She started to shake her head and he noticed her eyes began to change into the deep crimson-on-black orbs they became when her power was building up inside of her. He grabbed her shoulders and gave her a breif, violent shake, startling her out of the midst of gathering her power.  
  
"Look at me!" He commanded and Toshi felt she could not refuse. Like a slave drawn, unwilling by the tug of the shackles upon her will, Toshi's eyes, now back to their normal cornflower blue, riveted upon Cyclone's gaze, "You shall not deny my power!"  
  
She nodded, feeling oddly at peace, his eyes were odd, she thought vaugly as a still uncaptured part of her being screamed for her to turn her face away quickly, to look away before it was too late! "N-no!" The words felt forced from her as she tried to turn away. It was so hard.so hard to.move. "I.will.not.be.controlled."  
  
"Oh, but you will be," He chuckled, knowing that his rarely used skill as a master hypnotist would be more than enough to win her to his side, and after he'd gotten her it would be little effort to bring the others over. Though, I see more trouble with that irritating Saiyan Prince and the Namek. He thought, as he felt Toshi slipping, once more, under his control, Ah, well, all in good time.  
  
At the exact same moment; Piccolo outside, in the middle of the deeply altered state of meditation and Terra in the middle of a series of disturbing images which flashed through her mind as her body sought sleep, jerked out of their inward worlds and felt Toshi's silent cry for help.  
  
"Cyclone." Piccolo growled, as he teleported.  
  
"My brother, stop this!" Terra cried as she ran into the living room at the same moment Piccolo appeared and leapt foreward to jerk Toshi away, "What have you done to her?!"  
  
Piccolo held Toshi in his arms, she seemed listless and her head lolled back like a ragdoll's. He looked down her somehow sightless eyes and felt somethin akin to rage just beneath the surface of his thoughts. With clenched teeth, fangs showing, he handed the woman he loved more than his own life over to Terra, who he knew would protect her and faced Cyclone.  
  
"I'll kill you for this!" He started to gather his ki, building his power higher and higher, fairly glowing with strength, "I'll kill you!" 


	25. Fire Burns, Trouble Brews

Piccolo had felt his namekian blood run cold when he'd seen the emptiness reflected back at him from his love's eyes and had turned towards the person he knew was to blame with the only thought seething in his mind to reck havoc in the name of vengence and would have directed that simmering rage in the form of a ki blast straight at the half-stting, half-reclining figure before him had Terra's glowing green orb-topped staff not been jammed suddenly in his path.  
  
"No, Piccolo." Terra's soft, melodious voice said quietly near his ear, "If you kill him he cannot restore Tori to her normal self. Only he can end the trance and bring her back."  
  
Piccolo glared at Cyclone as the young man, knowing he was saved, smirked arrogantly back at him. Growling, his fists trembling as he lowered them and the forming ki ball dissipated, the powerful namek said; "He better fix her, Terra," He did not take his black-eyed glare from Terra's brother, "Or your brother or not, he's dead."  
  
Tori, her blue eyes wide and unseeing, sat propped up in a corner of the room, some inner piece of her, some part not touched by Cyclone's hypnotic stare cried and cried for someone to help her, to get her out of this horrid darkness which was enclosing her like a dream she could not outrun.  
  
In a desperate effort to fight her way out, Tori had instictively reacted with the only thing that brought her even a tiny shred of comfort and security, her fire power, so to speak.  
  
Tori was burning from the inside out. Without meaning to, she'd tried to focus on a target, something outside herself, but trapped as she was by Cyclone's powerful mental barbed wire she could not attack anything outside of herself, he had set herself on fire. Her skin burned and bubbbled as the fire ate at her hungily and englufed her in flames which exploded from her very pores.  
  
Within herself, she screamed in agony as the inferno licked across her flesh and consumed her clothing in bursts of orange and red licks of fire. She heard Terra scream and Piccolo gasp and felt the rush of cool liquid wash over her as they tried desperately to extiguish her burning body.  
  
"Tori! No!" Piccolo cried, as another bucket of water appeared in his hands and he threw the water onto the girl who had turned her own power against herself! Why? He asked himself, why did she do that? It was his fault! He had to be! He thought as he saw Terra, from the corner of his eye, point her orb at the ground and the carpet rose up to cover Tori and smother the last of the flames beneath it's weight.  
  
Kneeling down, Piccolo cupped Tori's face in his hands and stared into her eyes, trying, by force of will alone, to summon her to her concious self. He shook her shoulders and pulled her into his embrace, crushing her to him and feeling her heart beating steadily beneath his own rapidly beating one.  
  
He felt as helpless to aide her as he had been he'd been imprisioned inside of Cylcone's water cell. There was nothing more he hated in this world that to feel helpless when those he cared for more than anything needed him!  
  
How powerful she is! Cylcone mused to himself as he watched Piccolo holding her and his own sister looking at him with shame and fear, If she'd have joined me when I'd asked none of this would have been nessessary. She would not have had to go through this.discomfort.  
  
Ah, well, with the dragonballs I will have no need of her, of my foolish simpering sister and least of all, that idiotic relic Terra so desires. He paused in his thinking to look at his sister and his heart softened a bit, But she is my flesh. I will find her the relic myself and make sure she is healed. Then I will part from her for good, my duty to her having been fullfilled.  
  
He lay back down, tired and felt his body continueing to heal itself under his half-focused direction. He'd been in fights before and had healed himself past the brink of death, he no longer needed full consentration on his mending to do the job.  
  
But, still, his mind and body felt that rest was needed and he closed his eyes, not fearing the angry green warrior as long as he knew that he must not be killed lest his girlfriend become a vegetable who was an occational fire hazard.  
  
~*~*~  
  
"I can't believe we found the seventh dragonball all ready, Chi Chi!" Goku exclaimed as he sat on the side of the motel bed he'd shared with his wife last night. Chi Chi was going through the dressers, taking out the clothing she'd carefully folded and placed there a few nights ago and packing up their suitcases once more.  
  
Goku bounced child-like on the side of the bed. She murmered under her breath, involved in her task, "I guess I shouldn't be too surprised, considering we're with Bulma! If anyone could be said to have a knack for finding dragonballs that person would have be her! Don't you."  
  
Goku stopped his chatter so suddenly that Chi Chi looked up from her folding and gasped at how pale her husband's normally robust face had become under his shock of dark, unkempt hair. She ran to him and bent down, holding his shoulders and shaking, crying; "Goku! Goku, what is it? What's wrong?"  
  
"Something.something's happened!" He got out, finally, "We have to return home! Now!"  
  
"But..."  
  
"Now, Chi Chi!" The saiyan shoved her away, without meaning to, and rose to his feet, "There's going to be trouble."  
  
~*~*~  
  
It's about time that idiot received my message, he thought as he floated above the house, nearly invisable against the darkness of the late night sky, It's hard getting through to a brain filled with mush! I hope he gets here soon with the others. I need to get the other Z fighters here soon, too!  
  
Piccolo knew that they would need all the help they could get if what his instincts told him were correct. Because he had the feeling, the gut feeling, that even if, not if, dammit, when, he corrected himsef, when Cyclone restores Tori he won't be done with them. The horrible images he'd seen in his mind during his recent meditations did not bode well for them at all.  
  
"I can't let him near the dragonballs!" He said to himself, remembering one very vivid image of Cyclone before the assembled orange-starred balls clumsily stumbling throught the summoning rite and asking the dragon what was the typical wish of any ego-maniac; Mainly, that of power, great power.  
  
If such a thing ever came to pass, and he shuddered at the thought, at least they wouldn't have to worry about that power corrupting him. Cyclone had all ready done a pretty decent job himself where that was concerned!  
  
There was no way Piccolo was even going to allow him that chance, however! 


	26. Z Meeting!

"What's going on, Piccolo?" The three-eyed bald man asked, standing next to a small, flying Clown-faced person, "Why'd you call this meeting? I was right in the middle of my training!"  
  
"Me too!" Yamcha said, sitting down, crossed-legged on the floor of The Lookout, "I was.right in the middle of something.err. important!"  
  
"You were chasing another female, Yamcha!" Tien snorted, "Like usual. If you gave even half as much attention to your fighting skills as you did to getting laid you could probable even beat Goku one on one!"  
  
"Hmm, fat chance," Vegeta said, standing off to the side, as if he considered himself above mingling with common folk, which of course, he did, "If I., The Prince of all Saiyans, haven't been able to beat Kakkarot yet, there's no way that pathetic excuse for a fighter will ever be able to!"  
  
"Yeah?!" Yamcha jumped up, angery, "I'll take you on, Vegeta Prince of Fleas!" "What! How dare.?!"  
  
"ENOUGH!" Piccolo roared, standing between the two would-be combatants, "We have more important things to worry about that your petty bickering, Vegeta, Yamcha! Knock it off! Now, listen to me, all of you! We need to get back down there and."  
  
"You can't harm Cyclone!" Terra said, she'd been sitting with Tori laying with her head on her lap. She'd refused to be left behind at the house when Piccolo and Vegeta told her they were leaving to discuss her brother and, of course, they couldn't leave Tori behind, alone, with Cyclone, however injuried he happened to be at the moment, "Remember, if you kill him then she may never recover!"  
  
"He's your brother, Terra," Tien said, stepping up to her and looking down at her. Her fingers twitched on the wood of her slightly glowing ivy-bound staff, "How about you tell us how we should handle him, if we can't kill him, what then? Invite him over for a game of poker?"  
  
"Why not just force him to fix Tori," The blonde andoid 18 asked, standing with her husband and daughter. Krillin and the others had arrived just in time to leave with Piccolo, Vegeta, Terra and Tori to The Lookout for this meeting.  
  
However, Chi Chi, tried from traveling, had refused and she and Bulma had opted to stay behind at the house. Chi Chi claimed she wanted to take a shower. "And I need a cup of coffee!" Bulma had said to Vegeta and the others, "Don't worry, I have the dragonballs safe and sound." She'd patted her packpack and added, "This bag isn't leaving my sight for a moment!"  
  
"And afterwards, we take him out." She pounded one fist into the palm of her other hand, looking quiet ready to take him out herself.  
  
"Terra!" Goku said, "Can you think of anything we can do that will get him to make Tori's head right again?"  
  
Terra's eyes flickered a bit, changed in a half-second than were back to normal as she turned away. "I am sorry for this, honesty, I am." She said, her voice soft, "I had a bad feeling when we first saw your blue and white planet on the veiwscreen of our ship. I even tried to tell Cyclone that something bad would happen there."  
  
She paused, turned her head back to Goku, her hand still absently stroking Tori's long blonde hair, "But, I cannot help you beat him, Goku. I will not stand in your way, but neither will I aide you. You cannot fault me. He is my little brother after all."  
  
A flash of anger washed over Goku's face, as her words sunk in, then, just as swiftly, it was gone and he nodded. "Your right," He said, "I can't blame you, Terra. You just take care of Tori and we'll figure out a way to handle this on our own." 


	27. Just An Author's Note But Please Read!

Sorry, this is not an update to the story.rather.  
  
I am going to plug a fellow writer here for a moment. Her name is Vicky Baker and she is where Ryven came from originally. Her work is some of the greatest Piccolo-related writing I have ever had the pleasure of reading and she needs more readers and reviews of her work. She doesn't have a ff.net account, but she just got one on www.mediaminer.org Please, if you love me, and I know you do.go read her stuff and leave a review, too!  
  
Her stuff on mm.org can be found by following this link:  
  
http://www.mediaminer.org/fanfic/src.php?auth=66758  
  
She goes by the handle; "Ryven Sorane."  
  
I will be updating soon, though, so don't worry!  
  
~Ami 


	28. Captive!

A/N: I am sooo sorry about taking so long to update this story! Thank you all for sticking with me, especially you, D. Yasha, sweetie! Also, sorry this is such a short chapter!  
  
~Ami  
  
Moaning softly in her half-asleep trance, Tori felt the others around her and Terra's warm fingertips upon her brow, the contact somehow soothing. She heard all the voices and tried to keep them straight inside her mind which belonged to who.  
  
She felt so tired. So very tired. Terra continued to stroke her hair away from her forehead as the others spoke in hushed tones.  
  
Suddenly, Tori's eyes snapped open. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She clutched at Terra's lap, gripping material in her fingers as her heart raced beneath her chest.  
  
She felt as if she'd just been shoved into an icy river and was struggling desperately to stay afloat. Still unable to speak, Tori continued to writhe frantically on the floor where Terra, startled, had dropped her.  
  
Finally, her mouth seemed able to form words.  
  
"S-stop...stop it! Stop it! Please!"  
  
Piccolo was at her side in an instant, pulling her towards him, "Tori? What is it? Is he hurting you?!"  
  
Tori, knowing that the namek mean Cyclone, of course, grew quiet, her blue eyes hazed over and still. She looked lost and afraid, though no longer in a trance. She buried her face between Piccolo's shoulder and arm, tears falling, wetting his gi, "Please..."  
  
She shivered as if she were cold and he drew his cape about her, cradling her as if she were an infant, rocking her gently. Those who looked on could only stare, or in some cases, sneer, but Piccolo did not care. Tori clung to him like a lifeline and sobbed. She dared not voice her latest vision....yet....yet she knew she had to.  
  
~*~*~  
  
"Ah, yes, the girl," He muttered, sitting up, rubbing his temple, "Her powers are great. Even she does not know the full extent of their use...fool!"  
  
Cyclone's injury was nearly healed. Or, at least, healed enough for him to put his plan into action. He turned his right arm over to look at his wrist. He tapped it gently and the skin folded over to reveal a metal compartment filled with buttons and blinking red and green lights. Without waiting, he quickly touched out a succession of codes and slid his flesh closed, it snapped shut and the seams disappeared into his arm.  
  
Not many knew of his little...enhancements. He hadn't even thought to mention them to his sister, privy as she was to nearly all of his thoughts and emotions. He heard voices coming from the direction of the kitchen, but that was not what was drawing him. He could feel...something...powerful...calling to him. Like a moth to a flame. He drew nearer and nearer.  
  
"...Still can't believe how easy it was!" Chi Chi scooped up the last of the coffee and poured the sparkling dark grounds into the maker and flipped the switch. She sat down across from Bulma and eyed the hot pink backpack Bulma had set in the center of the table, "Now, all we have to do is call the dragon..."  
  
"Not so fast, Ladies." Cyclone vanished and appeared directly behind a startled Bulma, he had one arm about her neck the other held Chi Chi at bay, "Hand me the bag, woman! Do it or she dies..."  
  
As if to make his threat seem more real, he clasped a hand over Bulma's mouth and nose, Chi Chi gasped to see her friend's stomach rising, growing larger and larger as if she were about to give birth, Bulma struggled under Cyclone's vice-like grip. "I am filling her with water. Like a balloon," Cyclone laughed at his own vileness, "More and more...soon, there will be no more room...then....she'll just....POP!"  
  
He said this last with a loud emphasis on the word 'pop', making Chi Chi jump and scream. She began to reach for the backpack when Bulma screamed from behind Cyclone's hand and shook head violently. Chi Chi could easily read her. She did not want her to give the dragonballs away. Especially not to one like him! Yet, what could she do?  
  
"That it," Cyclone said, "Hand them over and your friend won't explode like a waterballoon left under the tap too long..."  
  
"Mmmph!" Bulma cried, her blue hair falling into her eyes, she kicked at Cyclone but where her foot tried to connect, he became water, only the parts of himself holding her remaining solid, "Mmph...!"  
  
"I'm sorry!" Chi Chi cried, tears streaming down her cheeks, "I have to!"  
  
Upon the lookout, Vegeta gasped and cried out, his fists clenched, "Bulma!"  
  
"Wise decision," Cyclone said, grasping the heavy bag in one hand, Bulma in the other. He could feel the woman's mate near, very near. He shoved the bag by it's handles up onto his shoulder and brought his wrist to his mouth. Pulling with his teeth, he got the top open once more and used his tongue to press a few buttons.  
  
"Bulma!" Chi Chi cried as her friend and captor shimmered then disappeared from sight. "No!"  
  
Cyclone let go of the woman, who'd startled to bite his hand. It was difficult to keep going in and out of liquid form as he'd been doing, and shoved her roughly away. He turned from her and several bars of steel came crashing down to the floor, enclosing her within them. He sighed and looked out the veiwscreen of his ship, the small blue and white ball spinning slowly before him before he turned his attention towards the backpack and what it contained. "You are so dead!" Bulma cried from the corner of the room, her hands wrapped about two of the bars closing her in, "Just you wait until my husband gets to you!"  
  
He barely glanced at her. "What? Your husband? Oh, Vegeta, Mighty Saiyan Prince," He chuckled at her glowering face, "What need I fear anyone after I've made my wish?"  
  
His laughter echoed though out the small spacecraft. 


	29. Unexpected Gambit

"No!" Vegeta screamed as he sped up, trying, in vain, to catch the swiftly escaping space craft. His hands curled into dangerous fists, glowing with crackling power, at his sides, he prepared to blast the vessel from the sky. A hand upon his shoulder stilled his action.  
  
He turned to see Terra, her odd greenish dark hair blowing in the breeze of her wake, floating slightly behind him. He raised a single brow in surprise at this manifestation of her powers, though he knew as well as anyone that mastering one's ki allowed for all sorts of seemingly incredible acts the least of which was flight.  
  
"Stay your power, Vegeta," She said, the orb about her staff pulsating with a deep illumination that seemed echoed within her eyes, "If you destroy the ship, you will also kill your mate."  
  
He started to bite back a stinging retort, but realized that she was correct. He didn't want Bulma to suffer, he was trying to save her! He noticed that most of the other Z fighters had converged just behind Terra and most waited for instruction, however, never one to take orders from anyone, Vegeta did not wait around for whoever, probably Kakkarot, to start giving them out.  
  
He turned and flew off to worry the problem by himself, which was just his style.  
  
"What do we do now?" He heard one of them say just before he was out of range, "That monster's got the dragonballs!"  
  
~*~*~  
  
It's all my fault... Tori thought, coming completely out of the trance-like state Cyclone had rendered her in earlier, If only there was a way...  
  
She was back at the house, Piccolo having carried her there after she'd cried out almost in union with Vegeta. She was laying in the bed that had become her's after her parents were killed and her house burned to the ground. She only wished she'd been able to use her own powers, somehow, to prevent such tragedy....  
  
Now, it seems more people will suffer, She thought, as she pulled the blanket up to her chin, shivering, Because of me.  
  
She noticed that the shadows had grown long, even though she could not tell for certain exactly how long she'd been laying here, and she thought that night was fast approaching. About to try and shove the covers over and lift herself up from the bed to go find out what she could do to help, if anything, she was stopped by a pair of voices outside her door.  
  
"...could do, you know that, Piccolo!" She recognized Chi Chi's soft, motherly voice, soft when she wanted it to be, that was! Tori hadn't lived her so long that she'd become immune to Chi Chi's sudden tirades. "I know," She felt her heart skip under the fingers she placed, almost without thinking, at her breast at the sound of his strong baritone, "But, there should have been something that I could have done...to prevent this!"  
  
Outside the door, in the hallway that barely allowed room enough for herself, let alone a seven and something and a half foot tall namekian warrior, Chi Chi bit her bottom lip and glanced towards the room she knew Tori was recovering in. Piccolo did not miss her pointed look.  
  
Within the room, Tori's fire power played about her body as she gazed at her reflection in the vanity mirror across from the bed. Her normally light blue eyes had changed to an odd color reminiscent of old blood, tiny sparks crackling from the edges and her light hair seemed like a ghostly veil over her pale features as it flew in tangles behind her, buoyed by a wind as hot as death.  
  
There was a way to prevent it, Piccolo, She thought, her throat choking back her tears, If only I'd never had...even...  
  
She had hardly finished the thought before she had lifted herself from the bed, her bare feet touching the floor only lightly, as if she were barely grazing the floor, which she was. The light blue nightgown Chi Chi had put her in flew about her and lifted a bit off the floor as she made her way towards the door. She paused, cast her heated gaze upon the ceiling and focused upon it instead of the door.  
  
In a few moments, a hole had begun to burn into the ceiling, revealing the beams and boards of the roof, she continued to focus her power upon the hole she was creating, careful not to allow the fire to get out of control. She did not wish to harm anyone, just to escape. She heard the doorknob rattling behind and knew the flimsy lock would not stop them for long.  
  
Touching a hand to temple, she tried something she wasn't altogether sure would actually work. Yet, she had to try. She closed her eyes and concentrated, the heat from her fire lifting her upwards, tried to find the one mind with whom she sought communication...it shouldn't be too difficult, considering the fact that she had been held prisoner with it only a few...hours? Days? She did not know, ago.  
  
** Cyclone! ** She opened her mind as she called, forcing back the urge to pile up block after block of mental barrier just to keep him from entering after what he'd done to her, ** Cyclone! Hear me! **  
  
Upon the ship, the young man spun about in the captain's chair, one hand clutching a lever upon the chair, the other resting beneath his chin as a smile crept across his features. His fair brows raised about his head as he laughed and said, aloud, "Ah, looks like the kitten has come for the mouse..."  
  
Bulma, in the cage, pouted as she sat upon the floor, her fingers inching to get near all the technical equipment she saw all about her on the ship, though most of it seemed beyond her ken, she had always been willing to give the old college try when it came to electronics. She saw her captor laughing like the lunatic she all ready knew him to be, and wondered if Vegeta would allow her to have a hand in his undoing...  
  
** Cyclone! ** Tori's voice in his head was loud and unskilled, giving him an ache he hadn't felt since he and his sister had first discovered they could use telepathy to speak to each other and Terra had screamed too loudly inside his head, ** Cyclone! Can you hear me? **  
  
** Of course! ** He answered her and smiled to himself to feel her mental wince, an eye for a eye, he thought, ** Why are you bothering me? **  
  
** I want to speak with you...** She sent, ** To bargain.**  
  
In spite of himself, his interest was peaked, Cyclone sat back in the chair and pushed a few buttons upon the console. Soon the view screen shimmered and image of space before him dissipated until he could see exactly where the girl was.  
  
He smiled as he watched, from a view above her, as she lifted herself out the smoldering hole she'd made in the ceiling and roof of the house, the large green fighter and dark haired woman below her, yelling.  
  
The namekian reached out to grab her ankle before she was completely through the hole and outside into the early evening sky. He pulled it back with a yelp that seemed very out of character and looked down at his hand where Tori's very flesh had singed him. He touched a few more buttons and soon a grid was enclosed about her image upon the screen.  
  
** Don't move, ** He said to her, ** I prefer to do my business...**  
  
He typed in a code, his fingers moving with the speed of one who knows his ship, and the girl materialized inside the cage next the blue haired hostage.  
  
"...in the flesh." He finished, smiling and turning towards her as she gained herself and her bearings. Being transported in such a way, he knew, could be very unsettling on those who've never experienced it before. "Please, pardon the cage, Tori, dear," He went on, "But, you can't fault me for taking precautions, can you?"  
  
"Oh, Thank God!" Bulma cried out, moving towards Tori as if to embrace her, "Tori! You've come to save me! Did Vegeta send you?"  
  
Tori glanced at Bulma, feeling sorry that she had become a pawn in this horrid game Cyclone had chosen to play, but knowing that she could little to secure her immediate release. She needed to get out of this cage, however...  
  
"Cyclone," She said, hoping her voice did not betray the fear she felt, she'd been able to hide it enough from him when they'd been in telepathic interaction, but she did not know for how long she could keep up her bravado, "Is this how you treat would-be business associates? Lock them in a holding cage?"  
  
In spite of his concerns regarding her loyalty and her wish to perhaps do him harm, Cyclone's own pride would not allow anyone to be able to call him inhospitable to those with whom he'd decided to have dealing with. With a mere flick of his wrist, he touched the control which kept the cell door locked and closed and it clicked and slid open upon the polished space craft floor.  
  
Bulma, realizing the door to her prison was opening, made a bid for freedom, even though she would have nowhere to go save within the confines of the ship, and ran for the now-ajar cell door. Without thinking, without hardly looking, just feeling, Tori lifted her hand and put her thoughts into stilling the older woman's movements.  
  
Bulma...She thought, as she felt the slight resistance as Bulma struggled against her telekinetic hold, Please forgive me...  
  
"Tori!" Bulma cried, trying to move, "Why are you doing this?! Let me go! Tori!"  
  
Ignoring her, Tori walked out of the cage and the door slammed shut behind her. She let go of Bulma and recoiled inwardly as she smashed bodily into the closed and locked cell door, propelled by her own momentum and sank to the floor in pain. She hated having to deceive the sympathetic woman, but she knew she could not divulge anything to either Cyclone or Bulma.  
  
Not and have a single hope that her plan would work.  
  
"Please have a seat, Tori," Cyclone said, indicting the chair next to his, "You don't mind me calling you by your first name, do you?"  
  
She shook her head, tossing her hair as she did so, "Of course not! Partners don't stand on ceremony, do they?"  
  
His eyes lit up at her words. He reached out to take her hand she had to stop herself from pulling back and away in disgust. "So, you have, at last, conceded to my wishes then?"  
  
She nodded, doing her best to hide her discomfort, she thought;  
  
Piccolo...everyone...please, forgive what I am about to do...  
  
"How could I not?" She said, hating the lie which stung her mouth even as she spoke it, feeling Bulma's disbelief and fear as she watched and listened from the cell behind them, "When you've shown what it is to have such power...?"  
  
Cyclone smiled wider and gripped her hand tighter within his own. It seemed that everything was falling into place, better than had he actually planned it! He fought the inclination to pinch himself as the young woman, powerful and beautiful altogether, shared his glance as she sat beside him.  
  
"No! Tori!" Bulma cried, tears steaming down her cheeks, making her look small and childlike; "I thought you were my friend! How could you do this? How could you!?"  
  
Cyclone did not bother gifting the caged woman with another glance, he just ignored her cries. He missed the brief flickering from the corner of Tori's eyes as she tried to hide the shame she felt for having forced her friend to scream at her in such a way. All he could think about, now, was the future, and the potential that seemed now limitless in the face of his and Tori's combined strengths.  
  
Not to mention the dragonballs, he thought, Who better than someone like Tori to share them with? She, unlike my sickly sister, at least knows the value of one's dreams... 


	30. An Eye For An Eye

"How much longer?" Vegeta's biting tone pulled the man from his work, grease smeared upon his coveralls, wrench in hand.  
  
"This is delicate work, Mr. Vegeta, sir," The man said, looking back at the craft he was trying to fix, "Looks like she's seen her share of battles..."  
  
"If Bulma were here..." Vegeta stopped himself from finishing that thought. Bulma was the reason he needed to get this blasted thing working in the first place! "Just hurry up!"  
  
The man shrugged and went back to work, though by the looks of things he wouldn't be finished anytime too soon.  
  
Vegeta flew back to the house, propelled by this own anger and fear more than anything. He paced the grounds, fuming, fists clenching and unclenching, wanting so badly to go rescue his mate and deal his own brand of punishment to her kidnapper...as for that Tori girl...  
  
He still couldn't believe she'd actually betrayed them like that! After Chi Chi and Piccolo had told him what had happened, how could he not see it other than a gross betrayal? What he would do to her if he ever got his hands on her...  
  
For all he knew, she had been in on the plan to steal the dragonballs and his mate!  
  
Piccolo looked up from the place he was sitting, floating, trying to still his mind so that...  
  
"How can you just float there, Namek?!" Vegeta cried, turning on him, "That monster's taken our women and the dragonballs and all you can do is sit there?!"  
  
"I don't see how ranting and raging about is going to help, Vegeta." Piccolo said softly.  
  
He closed his eyes once more, ignoring Vegeta's snort of disbelief and the sudden wind as the saiyan prince lifted himself into the air once more, leaving Piccolo alone again. The namekian warrior focused his breathing and his thoughts. He knew he could do it if only he had time...  
  
He felt his mind floating, spinning though a void that could only be called space, stars and planets all around...seeking...searching...  
  
~*~*~  
  
"...and after we have used the dragonballs to make our wish, then..." Cyclone was rambling on about how powerful they would be, but Tori was barely listening. She nodded and smiled at the right intervals but her mind was elsewhere. She turned her gaze on the viewscreen and focused on a patch of blackness in the dark sky.  
  
Suddenly, she felt it.  
  
A tingling at the base of her skull. So subtle, if she hadn't been being still she may have missed it. Missed him! She recognized the pattern to the tingling and it became thought within her own head...thought that was not her own.  
  
** Piccolo! ** She whispered urgently inside both their minds, afraid that Cyclone would notice her glazed expression and catch on, ** This is very dangerous...**  
  
** I need to know, Tori,** He began, and tears crept into her eyes at the sound of his beloved voice inside her head, how she longed to be with him, to feel his arms about her protectively, ** Have you really betrayed us for...him? **  
  
The blast of her denial nearly knocked him physically backwards.  
  
** Of course not! ** She cried out within him, part of her that was still responding to Cyclone's voice outside her body urged her to shut down the communion before it was too late, ** I must go...tell the others...there is a way! **  
  
** Wait! Tori!** Piccolo cried out both mentally and aloud as Tori slammed her mental doors on him, wisking him back though the void into his own head and, as he blinked awake, back to where he was still floating beside the fish pond outside the house. Her last words echoed inside his head...  
  
"There is a way..."  
  
His eyes widened as, suddenly, he began to realize just what the girl had in mind.  
  
The dragonballs...He thought, standing up and taking off towards where he would feel Vegeta's ki signature the strongest. She said to tell the others but he knew he had to let Vegeta know what was going on first, then they could tell everyone else.  
  
"Vegeta!" Piccolo called out as he spotted him, floating high in the air, clouds surrounding him, it was difficult to breath so far up in the sky, "Vegeta!"  
  
The proud prince turned slightly, sighed and raised his dark brows in a query-like gesture.  
  
"She's going to use the dragonballs!" Piccolo said, and Vegeta grinned, shaking his head as if he'd all ready known as much.  
  
"Of course she is, fool!" He snapped, "And unless I can get that hunk of junk down there working, there is no way to stop her. Even if she doesn't know the words to say, they won't have that much trouble getting Bulma to speak them for them...will they?"  
  
"You don't understand..."  
  
"I understand enough!" Vegeta cried, dark eyes narrowed dangerously, "I understand that I have two beings to dispose of instead of just one!"  
  
Before Piccolo could do or say other, the saiyan prince flew off, rage crackling around him like a lightning storm.  
  
~*~*~  
  
Tori continued to watch the blackness, an odd feeling roiling within her stomach. There was something...not right...about the area of space she was staring at. She did not know exactly what...  
  
"Tori?" Bulma, from the cage behind them, whimpered, her voice hoarse finally from crying out, "Tori, what do you see...out there...?"  
  
Cyclone turned in his seat, a mixture of rapture and boredom playing across his features. "My dear," He began, "What are you...?"  
  
"Something..." Tori blinked, realizing that the space directly ahead of them was devoid of any stars, just a large dark space. Suddenly, as if slapped across the face, she got it. "Cyclone! Look! Do you see it?"  
  
He looked where she was pointing, her hand shaking, and eyes widened in disbelief. "I-it can't be...!"  
  
She fell backwards into the chair, unable to keep the force of what she was feeling in check any longer. Hands to her temples, her eyes squeezed shut tight against the sudden onslaught, Tori cried out in pain and terror. Though it was not her pain nor her terror with which she voiced the agony.  
  
A million voices, emotions, feelings, spirits, all crying out, screaming, grabbing, clawing, reaching for something, for anyone, for her. The closer they were to the black space within space, the clearer she could feel it...the clearer she could feel them. She had never experienced anything like it. Never!  
  
Blood began to seep from her nostrils as her fingernails began to claw at her scalp. She screamed because to keep still was to do nothing and to do nothing was to writhe in unspeakable hurt.  
  
"Tori!" She barely hurt Bulma's voice screaming from the cage. However the woman thought of her, she still cared for her and the kind-hearted blue haired female liked to see no one suffering...especially not those she'd once called friend. "What have you done to her, you monster!"  
  
"I haven't done anything to her!" Tori heard Cyclone scream, his cries blending with those inside her head. She tried to speak above the noise...  
  
"T-that space..." She tried, swallowing back vomit that had rose inside her throat to choke her, "It...was..."  
  
Cyclone was busy checking his equipment, and gasped as he realized what Tori was seeing and feeling. He had no idea she was so sensitive...!  
  
"It was a planet," He finished for her, they were closer now, close enough to see the drifting pieces of rock that had once made up that world. "It was one that...was destroyed..."  
  
"So many...so many deaths..." Tori whispered, her eyes open, yet still unseeing, blinking back inner tears, "Can't you feel it...can't you feel them?" She turned to Cyclone, her gaze penetrating...making him flinch away from her, "They want vengeance, you know."  
  
"I had nothing to do with it!" He cried, stumbling over his controls, trying to turn them around and away from the specter of the ruined planet, a shiver coursed down his spine, "It was their own folly...!"  
  
Tori thought of the creeps who'd killed her family and a familiar rage filled her insides, coating her heart with a coldness thicker and darker than the blackest tar.  
  
Vengeance. Such a lovely word.  
  
"You had everything to do with it, Cyclone." She whispered, feeling her fire magic crackling all over her body, tiny licks of flame like demon tongues lashing out all over her skin, the flesh boiling and bubbling as it burned, though it did not hurt her, only served to fuel her anger all the more, "They came to you for help...you had to means to help them..."  
  
"I could do nothing...I...Terra...!"  
  
"They say that your sister wanted to help, but you overpowered her, when she was unaware, and escaped to a safe distance and watched them all die!" She glared dagger at him and even Bulma, in the cage, whimpered and pulled herself back against the corner, "An eye for an eye, Cyclone...it's only fair..."  
  
She reached out, her fingers like claws, seeming to belong to some other being, her nails growing longer and more sinister...curled and burning with her own heat, a searing heat that no normal person could hope to withstand. Seeming caught by her eyes, those beautiful blue eyes turned the shade of dried blood, nailing him to his chair as forcefully as if he had been lashed there with ropes, he could not move.  
  
~*~*~  
  
Pausing in mid-air, Piccolo gasped, as still somewhat connected to her, he felt all that she had being feeling and saw, from an outside point of view, the millions of souls now working through her to gain their ends. He saw her reach out, flame like blood dripping from her hands, towards Cyclone....  
  
~*~*~  
  
"Tori...no...what are you...?!" He cried out, a moment too late as her claw-like nails, hard as steel and hot with the fire all around her, slashed at his face, cutting into both of his exposed eyes before he could cover them protectively. He cried out in pain as he turned away, hands over his damaged eyes, dark blood flowing from between his fingers.  
  
Tori blinked at her hand, gore-covered and shaking, as if it did not belong to her. Cyclone had turned to ship around and they had been speeding farther and farther out of reach of the dead ghost-world. Slowly, she felt her mind become her own once more. Her telekinetically grown fingernails blackened in the heat and fell from her hand, like ash, as the blood continued to dry.  
  
"My eyes!" Cyclone cried out, still writhing on the floor where he'd fallen, groping in his own darkness, "What have you done to me...?! My eyes! My eyes...!"  
  
"I..." Tori tried, unsure, shaking her head, she hadn't meant to hurt anyone...only get her and Bulma to safety... She'd even given up the longing to harm those who'd killed her family because it would serve no real purpose other than her own sense of justice to hurt anyone else. "It wasn't me..."  
  
"Stay away from me!" Cyclone cried out, lashing out blindly, "Stay away! I can't see...can't use my powers...I can't see...Stay away from me!"  
  
Tori could not speak. She didn't know what to say. She could only stare at the man who'd once been so powerful and proud, who'd once stood before her and laughed at her mockingly as he invited her to join him in his bid for power. Now, thrust into a darkness of her making, Tori watched as he moaned on the floor, hands tight over his now sightless eyes.  
  
"It wasn't me!" She cried out, knowing that he was beyond being able to hear or understand her. Tears flowed down her face, dripping from her chin, "It wasn't me!" 


	31. We Come In Peace?

Crouching on the floor, her hands slick with sweat as she held the bars, peering between them, Bulma watched the frightened young girl as she stood over the man, who until recently, had been the cause of her terror and breathed in and out with small, sharp gasps of breath.  
  
"Tori!" She cried in a loud whisper, "Let me out of her and we can fly this ship home together! Please!"  
  
"No!" Cyclone tossed his head in the direction of Bulma's voice, "Don't listen to her, Tori! We were going to be...so powerful..."  
  
Tori looked from Bulma to Cyclone, seeming unsure of herself. The farther the ship drew from the wasted pieces of death planet they'd just been surrounded by, the more her mind seemed her own once more. She felt as if she were emerging from a deep dreamless slumber, everything seemed foggy and unreal.  
  
She looked down at her hands, they felt odd and sticky, unlike her own. Her fingers splayed before her eyes, she saw the blood drying upon them and dripping down her wrists and arms. It wasn't difficult for her to make the connection between her gore-covered hands and Cyclone's bloody twisted face as he covered his sightless eyes.  
  
"W-what have I done...?" She whispered, feeling dizzy and staggered against the control panel, "W-what have I done...?"  
  
"Please, Tori! Listen to me!" Bulma cried, slamming her fist against the bars, wincing in pain, "It's not too late! We can still get home! But, you have to let me out...!"  
  
"Tori, no! Please!" Cyclone cried, a shell of his former self, he was weeping bloody tears at her feet, grasping with soiled hands her leg, "Be with me! You promised you would be with me!"  
  
She shook her head, memory coming back swiftly as she looked down on him in disgust. Kicking him away from her she spat; "I wouldn't be with you if you were the last...thing...in the universe...!"  
  
"T-tor...!" She kicked him hard under his chin, cutting off his words and he sprawled across the floor. Without pausing, Tori waved her hand in front of the lever that releases the cage doors and said; "Hurry, Bulma! Help me get him inside before he comes to once more!"  
  
Smiling, the blue haired beauty hurried from the cage as soon the doors were open enough for her to slip though and helped Tori drag Cyclone inside the cage. They slammed the door shut and locked it behind them. Bulma wasted no time getting to know the ship's computer system.  
  
"He won't stay that way for long, Tori," Bulma said, her fingers flying across the buttons and keypads as if she had been born doing so, "Look around and see if you can't find anything that would help us keep him...out of our way...for a while longer while I do this..."  
  
Nodding, Tori began a search of the vessel, which didn't take too long considering it was a rather small craft. She found a cache of medical supplies tucked away inside one of the cargo holds, however and came back with a hypospray of something she recognized as a very strong sedative. She only hoped it worked on near-humans with powers like Cyclone's.  
  
Well, she thought as she let herself into the cage and knelt over him, turning his head to the side to expose his neck, If not at least it will muddy his mind long enough to make using his powers difficult and that will give us time to turn this boat around...  
  
He stirred a bit when she placed the sprayer to his neck and pressed down, the short hissing noise and popping sound beforehand told her that it had worked. He let out a soft sigh and seemed to relax more. She dropped his head on the hard ground and stood up, leaving the cage and locking the door behind her once more.  
  
Even the brief time she allowed herself to find the water supply and wash the Cyclone's blood from her hands hadn't been enough to remove all the stickiness or stink from herself and her hands were still a distinctive rust color...She longed for a nice hot bath with lots of suds and perhaps some soft music playing in the background and Piccolo massaging her aching shoulders while she soaked...  
  
Just as she was about to ask Bulma how much longer they had until they would be home again, the other woman let out an ear-piercing scream. Spinning around to face the view screen and Bulma, Tori gasped, her blood- stained hands flying to her face as she beheld what the other woman saw.  
  
"W-what..." Bulma sputtered, taking a step backwards, "What in the world...?!"  
  
"A-another ship!" Tori cried, standing slightly behind Bulma, she resisted the urge to reach out and hug the older woman as a shield against whatever was out there, "It's...it's.."  
  
"Huge..." Bulma finished for her, "I hadn't time to calculate in the jump back into hyperspace before it appeared..."  
  
It was a very large vessel indeed. Smooth and sleek, reminding Tori of pictures of great white sharks she'd seen sitting in doctors' office waiting rooms skimming through the pages of an out-of-date National Geography magazine while waiting to be called by the nurse when she was younger and her parents would take her to her check-ups and whatnot, it was much larger than Cyclone's own ship as well.  
  
From the looks of the weapons swiveled about on their craft and facing them, Tori would venture a guess that it was much more powerful as well.  
  
"Can we outrace them?" She asked Bulma, all ready knowing the answer. Bulma shook her head, chewing on her bottom lip.  
  
"No! Do you know what class of vessel that is?!" She shouted, her fingers flying over the keyboard once more as an image of the ship outside their view screen popped onto the screen as a three-dimensional graph spinning slowly around in place to show all it's nooks and crannies. "This hunk of junk wouldn't be able to outwalk that ship, much less outrace it! What are we going to do!?"  
  
Slamming her head down on the keyboard in frustration and fear, Bulma moaned loadly, "We're dead...we're so dead...that's it...I'm finished...stick a fork in me...I'm done for!"  
  
"Don't lose it on me, Bulma!" Tori cried, her own voice shaking from the effort she was putting forth trying to hold herself together, "Please, don't lose it!"  
  
Looking up, Bulma saw the tears shimmering from the corners of her friend's eyes and sighed, "I won't, Tori, I know this has been an ordeal for you, most of all, and I won't add to it by going insane with worry and fear...but," She added with a smirk that was so much like her husband's, "When we get back home and out of this mess, I feel it's my kami-given right to have a full-blown nervous breakdown!"  
  
Tori nodded, agreeing, "Feel free when we get home!"  
  
Suddenly, there was a clicking sound and a jerk which sent them flying across the room into the wall and each other. Tori asked what happened and Bulma's reply was not reasurring...  
  
"Tractor beams...they've locked onto us..."  
  
"Oh, no!"  
  
"M-maybe they're...n-not bloodthirsty aliens looking for a little snack before they head off to conquer new worlds...?"  
  
"Your fountain of hope spings eternal, doesn't it?"  
  
"A girl's nothing without her dreams..." 


	32. Difficult Decisions

"No! What's happening?!" Piccolo cried, his hands curled into fists at his sides, looking slightly upwards; "Tori! Bulma!"  
  
"Why hasn't the little fool used the dragonballs?!" Vegeta asked, floating next to Piccolo, "Bulma knows how for kami's sake! Are they going to just wait until they're both dead?!"  
  
"It would do them no good then, Vegeta," Piccolo said, eyes wide as he gazed upwards, trying to regain his previous communication with Tori.  
  
** Can you hear me, Tori? ** He tried, unsure as to why their connection was suddenly severed, only he could still feel a slight sense as to what was going on, it felt similar to a blind person stumbling around in the darkness, he could still use other senses to feel things around her, but did not know exactly what those things were, ** Please, answer me! **  
  
~*~*~  
  
"I...I can't believe what's happening," Terra murmured, arms wrapped about herself, her powerful staff fallen onto the floor, the orb's pulsing light dimmed drastically, "This is all my doing..."  
  
She, Chi Chi, and Goku had gone back to the house Bulma and Vegeta were sharing with them. The children, Goten and Trunks, had been sent to bed, much to their disliking, by Chi Chi and Goku.  
  
"Don't say that!" Goku said firmly, sitting on the sofa, his arm around his wife's shoulder, Chi Chi nodded, "Don't even think that! If it wasn't for you, we wouldn't have been able to even control your brother half-way!"  
  
"Without me, none of this would have ever taken place!" Terra cried, "It was a grave error in coming here, allowing my brother, always so...unsatisfied with what fate had dealt him...,to be temped by the power that is here..."  
  
"All is not lost, Terra!" Chi Chi stood up and walked over to the green- tinted woman, brushing her hair with her hand, "Don't despair! Remember, There are always the dragonballs!"  
  
"That's right!" Goku said, smiling his famous takes-over-his-entire-face smile, "If Tori can somehow manage to wrest control away from Cyclone, Bulma can use the Dragonballs to wish them back home!"  
  
Terra's eyes twinkled a bit as an emotion known to many creatures as hope danced across them. She took Chi Chi's hand in her own and turned it over, placing a kiss upon the palm, "You are very kind, Chi Chi," She said, sighing wearily, "But, I am tired...and ill...I need..."  
  
"You need to lay down!" Chi Chi cried, helping Terra to her feet, "I just wish we could do something to help you, too!"  
  
"I...I know, but..." Terra gasped, recent events having had their way with her dying body, she stumbled, with Chi Chi's help, back into the bedroom, "The dragonballs..."  
  
Before she could say more, the woman was asleep on her feet. Chi Chi put her to bed and tucked the blankets in around her chin, staring down at her for a long moment.  
  
It's just not fair! She thought, Use the dragonballs to wish our loved ones home safe or to save the life of this stranger...? Though we don't know her very well, and truth being, we hardly know Tori, both of them have shown themselves to be beautiful in their own way...  
  
How can we choice between them? She turned and shut the door as she left the room, not wanting to disturb Terra's fitful rest, wishing she could ease the pain of her leaving the fleshly world. How can the gods expect that of us?  
  
"You have to have hope, Chi Chi," Goku said, reading his wife's expression with little effort, hugging her tightly, "It'll all work out!"  
  
"Oh, Goku!" She cried, "What do you always have to be...so...optimistic!"  
  
~*~*~  
  
Tori, feeling Piccolo's desperation for her to respond to him lurking at the corners of her mind, turned to Bulma as the ship was pulled closer and closer to it's certain doom, "Bulma! Where are the dragonballs?!"  
  
Looking around, she quickly spied them under the captain's, what used to be Cyclone's, chair, still in the backpack, which was glowing with the power inside, "There they are!"  
  
She grabbed the backpack up by it's handles and opened it, dropping the balls onto the floor of the side, they gathered together like magnets and attached to each other, all seven, glowing brightly. Bulma looked at Tori, who looked at the monster of the ship they were being sucked into.  
  
"Are you sure...?" Bulma asked, hesitating over the balls, her hands over- stretched over them, "We...only get one wish...with these..."  
  
"Yes!" Tori cried, "We have no choice! Do it, Bulma! Get us out of here!"  
  
Taking a deep breath, Bulma began the solemn chant which would bring the mystical, powerful, wish-granting dragon forth...  
  
~*~*~  
  
"I...I can't believe it!" Piccolo cried, realizing what was happening, "She...she's actually doing it! They're calling the dragon!"  
  
"What?" Vegeta asked, eyebrows raised into his widow's peak, "It's about feakin' time!"  
  
"But...if they use the dragonballs now, then Terra..." Piccolo began, "...will die.."  
  
"Who cares, you moron!?" Vegeta said, jumping in the air, "At least your little girlfriend and my mate will survive! That's what's important!"  
  
"One life...for another..." Piccolo mused, turning from Vegeta, "Is this really the right thing after all?"  
  
"What's the matter with you, Namekian?!" Vegeta cried, grabbing him by his cape and spinning him around, "You've never shirked hard decisions before! So what if the bitch and her brother bite it, at least..."  
  
A disgusted look crossed over the green warrior's face and, without warning, he landed a forceful punch to the proud, yet obnoxious siayan prince's jaw, sending him backwards in the air. Rubbing his face, Vegeta glared at Piccolo, muttered something under his breath and flew off.  
  
"He will never understand..." Piccolo murmured, watching Vegeta's form flying swiftly away, "I..can't let her do this...!"  
  
Closing his eyes, poured all his will into breaking though the barriers Tori had built up inside her mind and the distance between in order to gain her attention...  
  
Sweat beaded his brow and he reached up, taking hold of his turban and the weight it concealed, throwing both to the ground, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand, his antennae trembling. ** Tori! Listen to me! You must stop and listen! **  
  
~*~*~  
  
"P-Piccolo...?" Tori gasped, the sound of his voice seemed like a healing beacon to her hurt and weary soul, she wished he were with her in the flesh so she could... Suddenly, the bombardment of his desperation to get through to her sent her reeling, "W-what...?"  
  
She sank to the floor, her hands over her eyes, head pounding. Bulma continued the chant as if she hadn't noticed her friend's sudden loss of energy. She knew she could not pause or the spell would not take...they were getting closer and closer to the other ship...she must not stop!  
  
** Tori! Listen to me! Bulma has to stop!** Piccolo's voice inside her head, practically screaming at her, ** Tell her to stop! You must not call the dragon! Terra will die! **  
  
I...I know, Tori thought to herself, tears in her eyes, I...don't know what's right anymore!  
  
** This isn't the way, Tori! ** Piccolo said, his voice calming down somewhat, but not by much, Bulma was halfway through with the chant, ** Maybe you can reason with the other beings...We need to keep the dragonballs wish for saving Terra, I've felt her strength and know she will not last long enough to locate their famed Crystal..."  
  
The Crystal that can heal her...  
  
"Yes, that one, but it's too late...I mean, it will be too late for that," Piccolo said, "She'll be dead in a matter of days, Tori, but you can use the wish to save her!"  
  
But...what if... Tori didn't want to think it, much less say it, They don't wish to see reason...?  
  
It's not fair! Tori thought, feeling like a spoiled child who can't get her way, she knew the right thing to do was to use the dragonballs to wish for Terra to be healed of whatever consumed her, but what about herself and Bulma? There was so much she would never be able to do...so much she would never be able to...  
  
Piccolo followed her thoughts and felt her sadness as if it were his own, his did not what to say so he said nothing.  
  
But who am I to deny another living being her chance at all that and more...? She thought, her strength of resolve growing brighter within her, like a pulsing golden star, even amidst her sorrow at what she knew she must do, I...can't let Terra die...not when I have the means to her survival at my fingertips...  
  
Piccolo didn't respond, he couldn't, his mind was too full of anguish to function properly. Choking back a cry of pain, Tori felt him as he closed his mind to her, and all she felt when she reached was an emptiness that made midnight bright by comparison...  
  
She reached out to still Bulma's chant on the second to last word. Pausing, Bulma closed her mouth and looked at Tori, fear in her eyes as she realized what the younger girl had just decided. She opened her mouth to protest but Tori's hands crackled with her fire magic and her eyes glared with her strength of purpose, backing the blue-haired woman up a few paces.  
  
"Tori, are you crazy?!" Bulma cried at last, "Look! We're halfway inside their hangar all ready!"  
  
"I'm sorry, Bulma..." Tori said, "We have to do this...put the dragonballs in an escape pod, program it for Earth..."  
  
"But..."  
  
"Don't argue with me! Would you be able to live with yourself knowing that if you hadn't used the wish to get out of this mess a friend would still be alive?" And Tori quickly explained about what she'd just learned from Piccolo about Terra.  
  
Bulma shook her head, sighing, "No," She said, "You know I couldn't."  
  
"Neither could I," Tori said, turning to look at the inside of the other ship, "I just hope they're...willing to talk..."  
  
Piccolo...She cried inside her mind, a desperate child seeking in the darkness, I'll...never forget...  
  
A/N: Is this the end?! Stay tuned to find out in the next exciting installment of... "Slumber Party!"  
  
Maybe I should think of different title to this tale, what do you think, it's gone far beyond the initial Slumber Party, hasn't it? lol.  
  
~Ami 


	33. Communication

Without meaning to, Bulma grabbed onto Tori's arm, squeezing it as she noticed something on the controls of the ship. A red blinking light. Her heart was pounding faster in her chest the closer they got to the inside of the alien vessel.  
  
Tori had all ready taken the little bit of time they had left to jettison the backpack of dragonballs and prayed they'd reach Earth in time to do Terra any good. If not, then her sacrifice would be in vain and that was the last thing she wanted.  
  
She turned her eyes towards the blinking red light just as Bulma reached over and touched it down with the tip of one of her perfectly manicured fingernails, trying not the tremble too much in her fear. "They're hailing us." She said, although it was unnecessary, even Tori, who'd never been on a spacecraft in all her short life, knew what was happening.  
  
The viewscreen shimmered and formed a picture of beings who looked, surprisingly enough, much like human beings, filled the screen. A male officer with a female standing behind him appeared and looked at them with eyes like large dark onyx, more curious than malevolent.  
  
Cyclone, in his cage, moaned in his drugged state, as though he could feel the tension in the air between the two races facing each over of the veiwscreen, unsure what to do, what would be the right move, now, to make. Tori looked up at the stately gentleman and didn't know how she knew him to be a gentleman, she just had a feeling as he stared back at her.  
  
They looked human enough, with only a few oddities that set them apart, such as their very large, oblong-shaped dark eyes that had no whites whatsoever and seemed filled with a million tiny stars twinkling in their depths, small mouths with very thin lips, (the girls noticed that the female on the screen seemed to paint her face in much the same manner as human females), and sharp chins that came to a point at the end. The two aliens filling the veiwscreen also each had a brilliant shock of multi- colored hair and very long, thin limbs and torsos, seeming able to bend at angles that would be considered odd to humans.  
  
Reaching out, Tori stepped forward and placed the palm of her hand against the viewscreen, unsure of what, exactly she was trying to accomplish, and felt a tingling at the base of her mind, like a tiny star reaching out, calling to her, hoping to be recognized amid the muddle of her thoughts.  
  
"Tori, what are you...?" Bulma began, blue eyes wide, still afraid of the beings even though they looked less like what her overactive imagination had painted them only mere moments ago. She backed a step away from the screen and the female alien snarled slightly, as if she took Bulma's action to be offensive.  
  
"Shh!" Tori hissed, gazing into the male's eyes, something about him reminded her of her grandfather who'd passed away when she was eight, he seemed to have a compassionate wisdom to him, "I am trying to speak to them..."  
  
"But, but we don't even know their language!" Bulma cried, and raised her hand to her mouth, "Tori, I don't want to die! I miss my husband and my little boy!"  
  
"Quiet, please, Bulma!" Tori said, "I need to concentrate!"  
  
A million stars were bursting behind her eyes in her mind as she forced herself to acknowledge the growing star inside her head, the one the alien was using to try and communicate with them, with Tori, and she reached out, mentally, grasping it and opening herself up as much as she could without removing her mental barriers she had learned to place up inside her mind for her own protection.  
  
In a matter of seconds the aliens took from her all the information they needed to make speaking with her seem effortless and they learned about her earthly culture in moments. Gasping in shock at such a forceful will having been shoved onto her own, Tori sagged to the floor, taking a few minutes to gather herself back together.  
  
"Are you all right?" Bulma asked, as Cyclone moaned in the holding cage nearby, "Tori?"  
  
"I..." Tori began, unable, yet to speak.  
  
"he being in the enclosure." The words, unrecognized by either Tori or Bulma, came over the speakers, soft and melodious.  
  
She swiftly realized that, although the aliens could understand them, the beings could not form human speech aloud, it was too difficult for them, but they could speak to Tori mentally and Tori could relay what they meant to Bulma, who was just staring in mute astonishment, which was odd for Bulma.  
  
"They said; 'The being in the enclosure.'", Tori said to Bulma, to the gentleman alien who seemed to be the one in charge of their vessel she asked, aloud for Bulma's sake; "What? Cyclone? What do you want with him?"  
  
"We have been seeking him and his sister, Terra, for quite some time," The voice over the speakers came once more, static coursing around the words, "We were heading towards your planet, Earth, when we recognized the ship you are on, the codes for that vessel match the ones your prisoner and his sibling own."  
  
"They are after Cyclone and Terra," Tori said to Bulma, "Though for what reason, I can't say..."  
  
"Well, ask them!" Bulma cried, chewing on her formally perfectly manicured fingernails.  
  
"They are wanted in relation to crimes against our homeworld," The tone of the voice had changed slightly, "We have reason to believe that his sister did not know of his actions, but since we cannot be entirely sure, we are seeking her out as well. They will tried, of course, and when they are proven guilty..."  
  
"Excuse me, when they are proven guilty...?" Tori interrupted, "Don't you mean if..."  
  
"Child, we are not from your simple backwards planet," The alien replied, speaking inside Tori's mind as well, "We prove a criminal is guilty before we even go after him..."  
  
"Then...What's the point of having trials...?"  
  
"Why, entertainment, of course!"  
  
At this the female and other, unseen crewmembers, (unseen due to the two blocking their view) laughed and smiled as Tori and Bulma continued to stare at them in disbelief after Tori had translated for her.  
  
"W-we can't just hand them over, can we?" Bulma asked, "Tori, I don't think this is fair to Terra!"  
  
"I agree with you, Bulma," Tori said; looking over at Cyclone, "I don't care about Cyclone, I have a gut feeling that he is guilty, but not his sister! I can't believe Terra could have anything to do with anything nefarious!"  
  
"You have no choice, human females!" The alien male cried, clearly losing his patients, Tori changed her opinion of him, he really didn't remind her of her grandfather after all, strange how first reactions can sometimes be dead wrong,  
  
"You will hand over the being in the enclosure and then give us the coordinates to locate his sibling, we shall take them both into custody!"  
  
Tori looked at Bulma and both girls looked over at Cyclone, unsure of what they should do, of what they could do.  
  
Terra would have the dragonballs wish to become well once more, but to what end? To be captured and kept for the rest of her life in a prison camp on some unknown alien world? How would that be better than death? Tori was afraid she had made a horrible mistake in letting that backpack go! 


End file.
